Our July 2012 Market Trip in Atlanta

Hello friends, it's Lindsay, Angie's daughter.  I always write the blog about market.   Enjoy!

Twice a year, we make the trip to Atlanta for market.  It's where you can order anything from lamps to mirrors, to candles, to jewelry, and more.  There are thousands of vendors and no matter how long we stay, we can never see all of it.  I took lots of pictures this trip, mostly of the things we ordered.  We were ordering for Spring of 2013 and gift items for this Christmas.  This is usually our most popular blog every year because it's like a sneak peek of the next season and a little look at what store owners see.  I wish we could bring you all with us!  There are a lot of pictures, so get your coffee and a comfy couch and settle in!

P.S. I couldn't figure out a good way to organize this blog.  There are waaay too many pictures and because we jumped around between gifts, decor, lighting, etc so much, I basically just have to throw out the photos and explain them the best I can.


In the hallways on the first floor, a lot of the showrooms make little window displays to try to get you to come up to see their merchandise.  Here's one that we thought was cute.

We have been looking for a good lamp source for a long time so we were thrilled when we found a place on this trip.  It's very hard to find lamps that don't look cheap.  They often have plastic-looking parts or icky shades.  The term we use with each other when the finish is ugly and we don't want to offend any of the sales reps is "NQR."  It means Not Quite Right.  We'll kind of whisper it to each other just to make sure we're on the same page. There are some showrooms where everything is NQR!  It's embarrassing! 

Got a couple of standing lamps.  Those are really hard to find for some reason.

In one of the temporary booths(smaller booths that are only set up during January and July market time) we often find someone who makes just a few things and offers a great price on them.  We ordered the 2 pillows below and an amazing quilt for a girl's room.

This picture is so dark and it's hard to tell how cute this quilt is, but let me tell you, it is freakin adorable!!  It is a very pale pink with aqua, lime, and a darker pink.  I posted this picture on Facebook and got a great response from it.  Everyone wants me to post something when it's in.  I promise I will!

We also found a company that makes crib bedding.  It's so hard to see in this picture but it should be in the store soon, so stop in and see it in person!

Another smaller, temporary booth had these wonderful ruffled bags.  They were suggesting using them as diaper bags, but you could wear it as a purse too. They will be here for fall.

Oh Peacock Park, how do I love thee?  Gina Galvan, the owner, is so amazing at designing, decorating, displaying, etc.  She has been in a lot of magazines recently because her own house is just stunning.  She is always there in the showroom helping people place their orders.

We ordered this lamp for the store.  It is so gorgeous in person.  It really looks old.

 

Got a fun rack for displaying bracelets

We wanted to order this reproduction of a dentists cabinet SO badly but we just weren't sure.  Maybe we will get it next time.  It's made of metal and glass.

We will be getting these Paris baskets.  They're really large in person.

Gina mixes old stuff like this big archway into her displays.  It must have been on the front of an old building.

Cool domes.  Wouldn't they be great for Halloween?

See the cow?  We have ordered her twice.  She is really special.

Peacock Park always has sweet live birds in cages.  They make such a happy little sound for us as we stroll around and look at displays.

This is the only picture of us at market!  We are always so rushed and distracted that we forget to have someone take our picture.  I actually snapped this while we were riding the tram in the Atlanta airport on our way in.

Have you been to the Atlanta airport?  It is HUGE!!!  Angie-mom(left)  Lindsay-daughter(right)

I took a couple of Instagram photos of our hotel.  It was kind of retro which is neat, but it could have been a little more updated.  It was, however, on the same block as the Merchandise Mart so we could just walk across the street and we were there.  When we first started out, we were staying 45 minutes away from market to save money and it was just so difficult to have such a long day and then have 1.5 hours of travel.  We've discovered that spending a little more on the hotel is definitely worth it.

There was a little place for snacks in our hotel and I was completely blown away by this soda machine.  Have you ever seen one like this?  It's so space age looking.

We were really keeping our eyes out for unusual, well made jewelry that would make a great gift.  These necklaces and bracelets made with maps were really neat.  We are going to carry 3 different images of St. Louis in the bracelet and necklaces.  These are going into the co-op downtown(The Collective-Check it out! ) too.

So, this next photo is something we didn't even know existed; temporary, removable, repositionable, wallpaper.  We have never tried it before but were totally intrigued with the idea.  Since we don't carry things we aren't sure about, we ordered the minimum number of rolls to play with on our walls and the fronts of drawers.  Then if it's amazing, we'll become a distributor and sell it.  I'll be sure to post about it when we test it out. It has already shipped. They were adamant that it can be used on furniture so we can't wait to try it!

Since we were ordering for Spring, we also tried to find some sweet gifts for Valentine's Day.  A lot of the things made for Feb 14th are soooo cheesy.  I hope the things we picked are a little classier.

This is a hanging heart shaped bud vase.  It makes a sweet, simple gift.

We got little frames and a mirror in a temporary booth.

This super sparkly chandelier will be arriving in the store late winter.  It's really well made and the glass is real, not acrylic.

Tee hee, this was in an area where they are really strict about photos, but I'm quick.  Plus, I was actually ordering things.  It's not like I'm copying their designs.

These next pictures are from Creative Co-Op.  We probably order more from them than anyone because they have such a large selection.  If I remember correctly, we ordered the lamp and mirror from the picture below.

We thought this tray was fun because it's mirror mixed with metal and fabric.

We got some great botanical themed items here including the cage and the 2 decorative hanging boxes.

Oh I just fell in love with the little mini domes on the stands.  Aren't they just fabulous??

Sparkles.  We are suckers for sparkle so these chandeliers were scanned instantly.  I'm dying to see them with our painted furniture.

This curtain has little falling feathers on it.  It will be here for Spring.

Oops, remember earlier when I said that trophies are always expensive?  I had forgotten about these.  We ordered a lot of them because they were so reasonable.  We are going to have a black and white section for Spring and they will be perfect.

Mercury glass stands

Recognize the table below?  It's one of our all time favorites.  We have sold a lot of them.  See the mirror with candle holder on the left?  We ordered it!

This is a new line of jewelry.  It will be here for the holidays so it will ship soon.

Believe it or not, these have already come in!  We just got back and some of the treasures are already arriving.

Ooh, ooh, here's a fun part!  Gifts!!!  We have so much fun picking out gifts at market.

This first one I found is a candle inside of a mercury glass container with a deer on the lid.  I thought for sure it was going to be super expensive. (that's the worst part about market.  Everything you fall in love with is high-end)  However, I was shocked when I looked at the tag.  It's a great price!  Perfect for the holidays!

One of our fabulous employees suggested a vendor she knew of from working in another boutique.  She said we had to go to Sugarboo for our gifts.  We stopped in and boy are we glad we did!

This is a box of inspiring quotes.  One for every day of the year.  They made the paper look old and the box is really fun.  They'll be here soon!

This set of blocks looks so darn adorable on a coffee table.  We love it!!

A great quote.

Ordered a couple of these lovely pillows too.

My mom just about fell over when we came across these beautiful cable knit throws and coverlets.  They are the perfect gift and the colors they come in couldn't be more soft and neutral.

We got the oatmeal, light blue, gray, dark blue and cream if I remember correctly.  I think in the coverlet, we only got oatmeal but we can always order the other colors.

I completely forgot to take a picture of the letters made out of old books that we ordered but I googled it and managed to find this picture that will kind of give you n idea of what's coming. (The ones we ordered are cleaner looking and cuter than this by the way)  They will be $12 each.

I really liked the balloons that were put into this old bathtub.  It looks like bubbles.  What a fun idea!

The next showroom we visited was Hillhouse Naturals.  We have carried their Fresh Linen and Cashmere scents for a really long time.  They always have jars of candy which we devour.  I was dying over this cabinet.  Not for sale though.

This is their new French Velvet line.  I think we might order that right after Christmas.  This company also has the spiced pumpkin scent that I'm personally in love with.

One of the showrooms had this massive old mail cabinet and amazing green couch.  I could have stared at both of them all day.  Unfortunately, we couldn't order either one but as you can see below, we did order some awesome rolls of paper to use as table runners!

We ordered rolls to display with and rolls to sell.  You can use it for tables, to cover walls, or really anything your creative mind can come up with.

The black paper below is going on our Halloween display table.  It's going to be so awesome!

At every market, we splurge on a few things that are really special.  I'm sure you can't tell in this picture, but the trim on this chair is made of leather.  It is really well made and we just had to have it.

 

Below are the ribbon samples for the rolls we ordered for next spring.  Customers keep asking us to sell our ribbon by the yard, so we finally ordered enough to sell this time.  Emily can always make you a bow though!

Lots of mossy stuff for our mossy terrarium section we're planning!

Ooh, this next set of pictures is from one of our all time favorite companies, Park Hill.  They make reproduction pieces that look almost identical to the actual old stuff.  Also, they are amazing with displays so we always get really inspired in their showroom.  We ordered a ton of stuff here.

These wooden bases and cloches are going to be so cool for next spring.  We are doing a whole section of terrariums and moss.

The table below was definitely a scary purchase.  It is sooooo long and heavy and we aren't positive where it will go in the store, but we HAD to get it.  It has a reclaimed wood top and it's tall so it's meant to be used with stools.  I think it's 10 or 12 feet long.

Our other large item purchase in Park Hill was this chicken wire cabinet.  It will be great for display!  Perhaps the cable knit throws will go inside this piece.

Someone asked us to find wall lanterns so we got the one below.

This sofa was awesome but a little too pricey for us.  Darn!  We wanted it!

One thing we were looking for was a giant birdcage to make a statement in the store.  This one is perfect!!

This candle sconce will go in our fancier area with all golds and cream colors.

Do you have as much of an obsession with trophy cups as us?  There is something about them that intrigues us.  We got several in a couple of different showrooms.  Why are they always kind of expensive?  We've yet to find a good set of reproductions that are inexpensive, but we got some anyway because they were so cool!

Dried boxwood always sells well.

Lots of people were ordering!

These glass boxes have been in the store before but they always sell really fast so we decided to re-order them.

Here is a window from a floral showroom that made us want to do a whole bright, botanical theme for next spring.  You know how we usually just pick white, green, gray, and tan?  Well this trip, we actually ordered color!  Can you believe it??  This area of the store will be a lot of turquoise, hot pink and green.

This bucket is a perfect example of the color scheme for the botanical area we will create.

These birdcages will fit right in too!

Remember how I said earlier that one section of the store will be all moss and terrariums?  This next showroom had perfect pieces to complete the look.

These are gnarled, mossy twigs.  I love them.

We got the crates to hang on the wall.

I already posted this curtain crown on Facebook and it got a huge response.  The reason it's so special is that it comes with this lovely fabric already attached.  This is going to be really popular.

In the same showroom, we found a couple of cute things for a girl's room.

Boy stuff!  We can never find good things to decorate boys' rooms with so we were really on a mission to make something cool come together.  We decided on a metal/industrial/red,aqua,blue theme.  We will mix it with old maps.  Here are a few things that will go in the area.

 Wouldn't this be a cool laundry cart?

Metal, industrial style tables

 You really can't see in the photo but these prints have maps behind them and they go with our color scheme.

A cool arrow shelf

This is a piece that looks like a locker but they put a mirror on the front.  It's really fun.

My boyfriend saw the picture of this shelf made to look like old pipes and he really wants one!  I think it would be awesome for a boy's room.

Below is a picture of a really pretty table setting done by one of the floral showrooms. We were DYING over those chair covers but they were so ridiculously expensive that we had to let them go.  So sad! We ordered a few things in here too.

If you've made it to the end of this post, congratulations, you have officially read the longest post ever, lol. We ordered soooo much more than I could have taken pictures of but I did my best. 

 Please let us know if there is something you'd like to be contacted about when it arrives.  We have a wish list going that we have gotten really good at checking regularly.  I will also have Sarah putting the new stuff on our website for sale as it comes in.  I hope you enjoyed seeing a little bit of what we saw at market!  Thanks for reading! -Lindsay