I’m a sucker for pitchers and bowls.
As you may know, pitcher and bowl sets were first found in Victorian boudoirs where they were used as wash basins before the advent of indoor plumbing. They’re still sought after as decorative pieces, and I’ve always loved them.
A few years ago I was in an antique shop and was admiring a lovely pitcher and bowl. I said to the dealer, “I love this one, and in fact I collect them, but I have so many, I wouldn’t know where to put another one!”
”If you were really a collector,” she told me, “you’d buy it first and worry about where to put it later.”
She was right, and so of course I bought it. And now I have at least a dozen in my collection, and each one has it’s own pride of place.
The last set I bought was on a summer‘s day a year or two ago. We were driving down a country road when I suddenly yelled STOP! My husband slammed on the brakes thinking there must have been a wild turkey or a fox on the road. Then he saw what I had seen – the sign on the tree with the best two words in the English language – YARD SALE.
The car had barely stopped when I was out in a flash and halfway across the lawn. For there amid a jumble of old furniture and dented pots and pans, I had spotted my new pitcher and bowl!
Dana Susan Lehrman
Dana Susan LehrmanThis retired librarian loves big city bustle and cozy country weekends, friends and family, good books and theatre, movies and jazz, travel, tennis, Yankee baseball, and writing about life as she sees it on her blog World Thru Brown Eyes!
www.WorldThruBrownEyes.com
And quite a beautiful one it is!
Thanx Betsy!
I love the set you pictured, Dana. Having collections of things like that, or tea cups, or cream and sugars, is the one down side of downsizing. At least I kept my grandmother’s canisters and some old family treasures housed in my mother’s secretary
Laurie, just yesterday a friend who is moving and trying to purge told me one thing she can’t part with is her grandmother’s canister set!
That IS a beauty, Dee. Wondering how you display your collection, whether in different areas around the house or in groupings. And do you ever fill them…with flowers or plants? And are pitchers and bowls the same as ewers or does it depend on what they’re used for?
Thanx BB! This one is indeed a beauty and I nailed it for just 35 bucks!
And no I don’t group them, rather they’re all over the house, some often holding fresh flowers and others sometimes holding dried flowers or leaves.
I hadn’t heard the term ewer so just looked it up and apparently ewers are just lonely pitchers – no matching bowls!
Very pretty, Dana. I don’t own one of these sets, but I have enjoyed looking at them and learning about them from Antiques Roadshow.
Good Marian, love Antiques Roadshow!
Dana, I love this story. Still chuckling over “the best two words in the English language – YARD SALE.” The pitcher and bowl set in your picture is stunning! What an interesting thing to collect! I would love to see your other sets, but it’s probably too much trouble to post pictures of all of them.
Thanx Suzy! I’d love to show off my other pitchers & bowls, but don’t know how, or if possible, to do it in comments so I’ll email.
Some are here in our CT weekend place where we’ve been sheltering, so I’ll take photos of those, and if we ever get back home to NY I’ll send photos of the rest!
I said I have about a dozen but truthfully it may be less, but am always on the look-out for more!
Lovely! Nice to be able to show off your collection. Anything that makes you happy to look at is worth collecting, IMO.
Thanx Risa, that’s so true, go for whatever sparks the joy!