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FeedFlea Market Fabulous
Two veteran Twin Cities treasure hunters reveal their secrets
By Wendy Lubovich
Photo by David J. Turner
It’s advice that has served Tina Wilcox and Laurie Luehmann well over the years. These two flea market veterans have bartered their way around the world, filling their respective Minneapolis homes with charm and quirky character.
Wilcox, founder of the retail consulting firm Black Design in Minneapolis, displays thousands of finds in her three-story home. From tiaras to taxidermy, her passion for collecting is legendary. “I just look for things that strike me,” she says. “I like the macabre and the extraordinarily weird.”
Wilcox has purchased truckloads of treasures for various clients, including Marshall Fields. She trained her eye in Paris and London, where she learned to shop both visually and viscerally. “You have to stage it in your mind’s eye,” she says. “I usually buy enough of one object so it looks like a collection, then I add to it.”
Step into her home library and you’ll find a quirky assortment of papier-mâché French Bulldogs that still carry the scent of the famed Parisian market, the Marchés aux Puces. Nearby, a grouping of antique dog collars adds fortification to the canine mix. “I like things to tell a story,” Wilcox says. “Often one collection will respond to another.”
Photo by David J. Turner
Similar to Wilcox, Luehmann has been collecting flea market treasures since her college days. “If you are drawn to something, it will always work,” says Luehmann, the owner of the Minneapolis boutique Luehmann (formerly Colibri). “Somehow, the piece will find a place in your home.”
Today, her modern North Loop loft, artfully filled with vintage finds, is a veritable cabinet of flea market curiosities. “I always say my home is where Ralph Lauren meets Charles Darwin,” says Luehmann, who now tracks down flea market trinkets to sell in her store. Her budding passion ignited 13 years ago when she lived in Holland and England. She scoured flea markets from Belgium to Scotland, packing her suitcase with fabulous finds.
Luehmann loves to collect silver and textiles, but she’s especially fond of natural curiosities such as skeletons and bones. One of her favorite purchases is a petrified dinosaur egg she displays in her loft—it was a rare discovery she found through an antiquities dealer in Oxford. “It felt so strange carrying it home in my suitcase,” she says.
Luehmann unites elements as disparate as elephant skulls and teapots by using a single color palette: browns and beiges. Punches of red supplied by a crimson couch and vintage Beefeater statue add pizzazz to her living room.
Wilcox is also a fan of the virtual marketplace, eBay, where she purchases everything from French furniture to stuffed coyotes. While the Internet adds new options, it will never replace the spectacle of a live market, says Wilcox. “I love the people, the smells, and the creepy things I might find.” After all, for the true aficionado, a day spent walking the aisles of a flea market is the best day of all.
Staging it Back Home
Even if a glorious watercolor or wonderful vase speaks to you at the market, it will need the perfect setting to make a statement at home. Here’s how:Collect in categories. Zero in on one type of collectible, amass an assortment of offerings, and display the items together. When collections relate, they make an intuitive impact. For example, if you collect vintage garden tools, collect and display antique garden books as well.
Tell a story. Use silver trays to compose compact vignettes, arranging items into a narrative. An old Bible placed on a table might be paired with a rosary resting in an incense burner.
Repurpose. A vintage postcard is the most portable of flea market finds. A quality digital copy shop can enlarge it to grand size, suitable for framing. Try the same technique with old documents or love letters. That old fur shawl? Use it as an eye-catching table runner.
What to Buy
Parisian flea markets, such as the famous Marchés aux Puces, offer hundreds of shops selling everything from furniture and art to clothing and bric-a-brac to their 70,000 weekly visitors. Whether you’re shopping in Paris—or any flea market, anywhere—the trick is to hone your focus. Veteran browsers suggest the following:Passementerie and Linens. Trims, tassels, and curtain tie-backs are easy to pack and add vintage panache to your home. Dangle silk tassels from drawer pulls and door knobs. Or use vintage trims to dress up ready-made drapes. Don’t let a few stains dissuade—sheets and pillowcases with small stains can be dyed lush colors back home.
Silver and hardware. Aged flatware can be re-plated by a silversmith when you return home. Trays are always useful, either functionally or as wonderful display pieces, and diminutive teapots make great sculptural objects on shelves. Old drawer pulls and door hooks can be easily repurposed. Small lamps can be rewired to U.S. standards.
Books and art. Small, beautifully bound, leather books add a scholarly air and can be artfully propped open, perhaps with an antique magnifying glass displayed on a page. Search for affordable student artworks, such as drawings and watercolors, or collect vintage magazine covers and illustrations, then frame several of them in a unifying color.
Wendy Lubovich is a Minneapolis freelance writer.
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11 ISSUES (1 YEAR)
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