Summer Pop-Up Sale Is In The Books!
This evening I am happy to be seated after seven straight days on my feet preparing for and hosting our summer pop-up sale. Thank you so much to all of you who attended, it was great to see you! Our Mount Prospect estate sale which is only five blocks away is continuing on Monday but I decided to end the pop-up on Sunday. However if anyone needs anything, I will be in the garage from 10:00 to 4:00, Mike will be helping me break down the sale and get jewelry ready to hit the road this coming weekend. In between customers this past weekend I was able to finish pricing all of the Tibetan jewelry and I put together a large case filled with goodies. There is enough to at least fill a medium case as well! I am excited to finally present this jewelry collection in its entirety which I painstakingly chose at the Tucson Gem Show back in April. Below is a snippet of the large case.
This jewelry is amazing, such nice quality and so reasonably priced for silver with genuine stones. The woman I purchase from brings the jewelry to Tucson directly from the villages in Tibet and the artists take great care in handcrafting each piece. There are other vendors but this jewelry and vendor are by far the best! She told me that other Gem Show vendors buy from her, mark it up ten times and then sell it at other locations at the show. I thought that really takes a lot of guts! There are still plenty of chances to wear this colorful jewelry through summer and fall and it is perfect to take along on a trip to a sunny locale.
I also started working on getting my extensive collection of vintage Mexican silver jewelry up and running. I priced quite a bit of it over the winter but I hadn't written Mexico on all of the price tags. I decided to make the tags consistent so they are easier to find and keep together. I will be putting together a case filled with very cool modernist pieces which I think will complement our La Grange Park sale which features high-end mid-century modern furniture and smalls next weekend. The higher-end pieces will go in the online store as well as on eBay and Etsy.
I had a meeting with Claire this week, she is Maureen's niece and worked with us about ten years ago. I cannot believe it has been that long! She is between jobs right now and is going to help me get some of these items posted. She helped me at the time and does an amazing job. Claire has a beautiful Etsy shop with vintage clothing and other goodies. She is very meticulous like me and I totally trust her to create high-quality listings for me. I gave her a shoe box filled with antique to vintage sterling silver and a shoe box filled with newer Mexican silver including Frida collection pieces. She is also going to model some of the pieces and I am excited to see what she will come up with. I wish it could be ongoing but I will take what I can get!
Melinda made the drive from Arizona to where she stays in Barrington, arriving on Thursday. She is here to help us out and also get out of the heat for a while. She took a bit of a detour first to visit her friend near Tucson before heading back up north again. Melinda really enjoyed the drive which was a new route for her and I think she will take this route from now on. She usually goes up and over the mountain through Sedona and Flagstaff before heading over towards Albuquerque. However Flagstaff has been experiencing bad storms and flooding, plus it is challenging to go through this area in the heat of the summer. It is a very busy truck route and the large trucks have trouble picking up enough steam to make the incline. Melinda made it in time to help me out at the pop-up Friday through Sunday which was great. I set up a little table and a chair for her in the middle of the "command center" where many of the jewelry cases were located, that way she could set up her lap top and take the estate sale calls. Kuochun kindly brought us lunch each day - Friday was Jimmy John's, Saturday was Hubby's In The Dog House and Sunday was Taco Town. I do not know what we else would have chosen should there have been a fourth day with Melinda!
I made a big splurge jewelry purchase from eBay this week - a three-strand necklace with sterling pearls made by Marilyn Platero who is one of my top two favorites for contemporary Navajo pearls. The beads are each handmade and painstakingly burnished which gives them depth of shadow and makes them look like "pearls." I have single strands in many sizes in lengths as well as earrings and a bracelet and this is my first multi-strand. The strands are finished off with bead caps by Genevieve Apachito. I love that the caps are flat rather than round, they lay so much more nicely on the neck and also keep the strands from twisting.
I must have been watching this listing for close to a year. I bought all of my single strands from Castle Gap in Dallas years ago, who we discovered while visiting for the Roller Derby World Cup. They however seem to be phasing out of Marilyn's pearls and I was afraid to wait any longer as I might miss out. They were the perfect size beads for me as well. It was the most I have ever spent on a piece for myself but I did sell enough high-end pieces on eBay lately to pay for it. I have decided to quit trying to create these special projects (which end up not working for me and then I have to sell) and stick with the pearls and pendants. I wear these pearls every day and this is definitely a forever piece for me. It looks great with a V-neck shirt and I have quite a few right now. Before I made the purchase I wore my three single strands in the same sizes to be sure it was not going to be too heavy. Maybe some day I will be lucky enough to find a multi-strand bracelet by Marilyn and then my collection will be complete. Some other time I will talk about my other favorite artist for contemporary Navajo pearls, Virginia Tso.
Above is the jewelry lot I posted last Sunday evening - I experienced mixed results this time. The long liquid silver necklace, the three-piece turquoise necklace set, the turquoise and heishi nugget necklace and the onyx ring sold, the other items are still available. I am surprised that there were no takers on the cuff bracelets and the earrings, especially the cuff with the faceted hematite centerpiece and faux mother of pearl "claws." It is one of the most unique pieces I have seen in a long time. Eventually the remaining pieces will make their way to the online store! Due to the pop-up, there was not time to put a jewelry lot together but I have a package coming Tuesday with new arrivals and will be able to put together a nice purge next Sunday.
Goals for next week will be as usual, to continue to organize the jewelry. I will be pulling some sterling pieces that I have had for a while and marking them down to 75% off. I just have so much inventory and would like to become a little more focused in what I offer. Scheduling the next pop-up sale is also already on my mind. I have been doing a fall pop-up the first weekend of October the last several years, it is my favorite sale weekend of the year. Typically the weather is ideal - not too warm or too cold, sunny and clear. However since I had the summer pop-up, I may decide to postpone the sale for a month to November. More than likely I will be heading to Scottsdale in November and I am planning to do some jewelry selling there as well.
The estate sale at Melinda's next door neighbor went swimmingly well so she has kindly offered to host a sale in her garage before the holidays. I will be contributing jewelry, clothing, shoes and purses. Also, I will be looking into the possibility of hosting a sale in my garage in Scottsdale. Since there is a homeowner's association I will need to see what is allowed. I know at least they do allow estate / moving sales because I attended one while I was there, I am just not sure if the occupant needs to be moving in order to hold a sale. I did see a snippet in one of the community newsletters about an annual garage sale in January or so, it was cancelled in 2020 due to the pandemic. I sure hope they bring it back! I would really like to keep the jewelry selling year round so I am able to keep offering fresh finds. I anticipate that the final pop-up of the year will be a "last hurrah" before much of it goes to Arizona to be sold.
I am signing off for this evening, see you next time!