Tag sale: Brush up your Basic French
In honor of Bastille Day (July 14), and because she just rented her house for an entire year, Carol Neiley, owner of Basic French, is having a tag sale at her Red Hook shop this weekend (Friday-Monday). Most of the stuff in the sale comes from her much-published (Victoria, Country Home, Romantic Home) farmhouse nearby, which she has let furnished but sans excess linens, baskets, dishes, and doo-dads, such as those in the photograph below.
“I love both places,” says Neiley, referring to Red Hook and Lyon, France, where she owns another house. “I have worked hard to get this combo.” Last year, she enrolled her daughters, Halliday, now 13, and Abigail, 11, in the International School in Lyon. They both thrived, so they are returning for a second academic year, to bring their French up to “grade level”—full fluency. After that, the trio expect to return to Red Hook.
Carol was only 15 herself, when, on her first visit to France, she fell in love with the very ground beneath her feet. Years passed, she became a successful graphic designer in New York City, but the French itch wouldn’t go away. In the 90’s, she and her then husband moved full-time to their farmhouse near Red Hook and, even as they were starting a family, Carol began easing out of graphic design and inching toward retailing. For several years, juggling graphic-design jobs and childcare, she worked up budgets and business plans in her spare time. Finally in 2002, she opened a shop that sells all things French.
French, yes, but not the usual: There are no lace curtains, no olive-themed dishes or table linens, no Soleido printed fabrics (think: Pierre Deux) at Basic French. Instead, Carol specializes in the stuff of la vie quotidienne, everyday life—cleaning supplies, toiletries, the sort of rattan carry-alls (above) French housewives take to the market. There are exceptions—some lovely antique linens, some dishes and glassware, smocked dresses for little girls, baby clothes by Le Petit Bateau—but most things are practical and lean toward the modern. Wherein lies the whimsy of the store: MiR dishwashing liquid is their #1 bestseller. “You have to smell it,” Carol says. “Nobody does scent like the French.”
Well, sure, French perfume, but dishwashing liquid? “At the luxury level, every country’s stuff is the same,” Carol argues. “Hermes and Bottega Veneta are both fabulous and completely international.” But garbage bags: who but the French would have purple ones? And who but Carol Neiley would import them to sell in a shop in upstate New York?
Basic French
5 E. Market Street, Red Hook; 845.758.0399
Daily 11 - 5
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Posted by Marilyn Bethany on 07/08/08 at 05:39 PM • Permalink
The Heart & Soul of Rhinebeck’s Paper Trail (Part 1: At Work)
Indie card and party stores are an endangered species. When I need a birthday card, wrapping paper and candles for a cake, I unfortunately find myself heading too often to CVS, Stop & Shop or, most depressingly, Rite Aid. So it’s no wonder that the first time I walked into Paper Trail in Rhinebeck it felt like a mirage. Here was a stationery store with personality, pizazz and polish—the kind of well-merchandised boutique where the prosaic paper cocktail napkins are curated so that you want to study every package and you find yourself filling a shopping basket with notecards, paper plates, candles, amusing little books and all manner of ephemera that you will keep in the closet as last-minute gifts. Paper Trail is the three-year-old love child of Maureen Missner and Serine Hastings, who have been friends for a quarter of a century. The two Midwesterners met at Crate & Barrel in Chicago when that store was a cutting-edge retailer. For twenty years, they have run The Loom Company, a New York based home-and-fashion showroom that represents makers of ceramic and glass tableware, frames, desktop and decorative accessories, handbags and jewelry. 
Missner has owned a house in Clinton Hollow (12 miles from Rhinebeck) for twenty years, and it has always been more of her spiritual home than Manhattan. “Paper Trail is my ticket to being a full-time country resident,” says Missner, who now only spends two or three days a week in the city. While talking to Missner about Paper Trail, it becomes clear that only a very sentimental person could pull off such a stylish yet soulful stationery store. “You celebrate life’s occasions in the stationery business,” she explains. “The best selling cards are for birthdays. The second best-sellers are sympathy cards.” She loves helping brides with their invitations and is gratified that several women who got married shortly after the store opened are now coming back to order baby announcements. 
While Paper Trail has a sophisticated big city feel, it has small-town values. And contrary to perceived wisdom, Missner says that weekenders are not her best customers. “I knew we had to have a local client base for acceptance and survival,” she says. “In our third week, a retired teacher from the Rhinebeck public schools named Dot walked into the store and said, “Oh this is wonderful.” That was when I knew we were going to make it.”
Paper Trail
6423 Montgomery Street, #6, Rhinebeck, NY; 845.876.8050
Monday - Saturday 11 AM - 6 PM; Sunday 11 AM - 4
To see how Maureen Missner lives at home, Click here
Posted by Dan Shaw on 06/25/08 at 04:46 PM • Permalink
Agapanthus: An Oasis of Chic in Lakeville
Retail guru Arlene Dubin and shopkeeper Lynne Bragonier
Arlene Dubin remembers when “country style” was a contradiction in terms. When she arrived in northwestern Connecticut in 1970, her situation resembled the hit television show Green Acres about a sophisticated city woman giving up a penthouse (and stores!) for a farmhouse (and chores!) Arlene’s husband wanted to be a country lawyer, and he persuaded her to quit her high-powered job as a buyer for Saks Fifth Avenue to open an upscale inn on Route 41 in Salisbury. “We were ahead of our time, which is the story of my life,” she says. “When the gas crisis hit in the 1970s, that was the end of the inn.” Adapting to country life was not easy. When she’d walk into the pharmacy dressed in black, the clerks would always ask, “Who died?” 
She was especially dismayed by the rural retail scene. “There were no shops in Great Barrington!” she says in her gravelly smoker’s voice that hints at her days living in the bohemian Greenwich Village of the 1950s. “There were no shops in Millerton—except Saperstein’s!” So Arlene rectified the situation by opening a sophisticated housewares and gift shop called Settings in Lakeville (where there weren’t any stores either). “I sold table settings, African bronzes, whatever struck my fancy.” Settings operated in several locations before closing many years ago.
Arlene now works at Agapanthus, an eco-chic, hybrid home-and-fashion shop on Main Street in Lakeville (which is, coincidentally, across the street from the first home of the late, lamented Settings). In an unusual role reversal, she is mentoring her boss, Lynne Bragonier, a retail novice. Arlene has been instrumental in helping Lynne refine the concept of the store, which was originally going to be a variation on the upscale garden chain Smith & Hawken. “When I met Lynne, she had a vision but she didn’t have a clue,” Arlene says affectionately. “She invited me over to her house where she had all her merchandise, and I said, “This does not a store make.” Arlene encouraged Lynne to add clothing and jewelry to the mix. “When we first opened, people saw the tables in the window and thought we were a restaurant,” says Arlene. “They’d walk in and say, ‘What time is brunch?’” Arlene’s solution: She sprinkled pieces of jewelry on the table settings. “That’s what I did at my first store, too.” Agapanthus has become one of those stores where customers stop by even when they are not looking for anything in particular because they just want to hang out and look at pretty things. “They consider it an oasis,” says Arlene. “They love the ambiance—the light, calmness, serenity and colors.”
They also love Arlene. “People trust her taste and she tells it like it is,” says Lynne. Arlene is like a character out of a black-and-white movie, the tough-as-nails career woman with a heart of gold beneath the chic exterior. She enjoys reminiscing about her career at Saks Fifth Avenue, when the owner, Adam Gimbel, asked her to start an active sportswear department. “You couldn’t find a tennis dress made in America then,” says Arlene, who would go on buying trips to Europe. “You couldn’t find ski clothes made here either.” She also helped develop the concept of “fun furs” at Saks. “Women wore mink and sable, of course, but there were no furs for wearing in the country or après ski. That became a very big business."She has brought Saks appeal to every place she’s worked ever since. She helped gentrify the Salisbury Pharmacy for its owner, Elaine LaRoche, who hired her to open Passports, a nearby Asian antiques and accessories store. When Arlene’s husband was at the Noble Horizons nursing home for two years, she opened a shop there. “We sold hats and scarves, jewelry, candy, things the residents could give to each other,” she says. Bragonier cannot imagine Agapanthus without Arlene. “Even though she balks when most assume she’s my mother, there is a strong connection—and she does try to mother me,” says Lynne. “Fiercely loyal, stylish, accomplished, opinionated, and politically savvy, she keeps me on my toes.”
Agapanthus
329 Main Street, Lakeville; 860.435.8900
Monday - Saturday 10 AM - 5 PM; Sunday 11 AM - 4 PM
Lynne Bragonier outside her shop.
Posted by Dan Shaw on 06/20/08 at 07:08 AM • Permalink
Trend Alert: Iron Garden Accessories
A “before” photo at Bunny Williams’s garden with Battle Hill Forge cages
Two of the best-respected gardeners in northwestern Connecticut—Lee Link of Sharon and Bunny Williams of Falls Village—are both besotted with handmade metal ornaments made by the young fellows at Battle Hill Forge in Falls Village. “I learned about them when I was shopping for plants at the Falls Village Flower Farm,” says Link, whose garden has been featured in several magazines and as part of the Garden Conservancy Open Days. “I saw their wattle and I thought it was brilliant.” Wattle is a type of woven fencing that you see in high-end garden catalogs that is used to create define parterres of to elegantly organize a vegetable or cutting garden. “I had the traditional wattle that is made out of twig and disintegrates after a year or two which is most distressing. This wattle should last forever.” Link has pieces made to her specification so she could create triangle beneath a trio of clipped Korean lilacs, planting the alternate sections with pansies and lettuces for the spring Williams, who is one of Link’s best friends, worked with the team at Battle Hill to design whimsical cages for staking dahlias and tomatoes in her vegetable-and-cutting garden. “They’ll look much better this summer when the plants start to fill out,” promises Williams’ chief gardener, Eric Ruquist, who invited us back to take more photos later in the season.
The iron wattle fences by Battle Hill Forge in Lee Link’s mini-parterre in Sharon.
Posted by Dan Shaw on 06/10/08 at 03:16 PM • Permalink
Gardening: Hudson Bush Plant Sale and Garden Exchange
At Clermont, a lawn studded with 200-year old locust trees.
In 1990 Dr. Norman Posner and Charles Baker invited gardening friends and friend of friends to their home, Hudson Bush Farm, in Greenport to exchange heritage plants. The event was so successful that they repeated it year after year. By 2000, it had outgrown Hudson Bush Farm and was moved to the Clermont State Historic Site, a 500 acre property overlooking the Hudson River and the Catskill Mountains that was home to seven successive generations of the Livingston family from 1728-1962. Now sponsored by the Friends of Clermont, some 30 vendors gather to sell (mostly) heritage plants. In addition, Friends of Clermont offers plant material grown in the historic gardens there, as well as gardening books and gifts.
Clermont State Historic Site
1 Clermont Avenue, Germantown; 518.537.4240
Saturday, June 7; 10 - 2
Posted by Marilyn Bethany on 06/04/08 at 04:16 PM • Permalink
Salander-O’Reilly Bankruptcy Auction at Stair Galleries
For nearly a year, the art world has been abuzz with news of the closing of the Salander - O’Reilly Gallery, and its subsequent bankruptcy filing. On June 7th, Stair Galleries of Hudson conducts the first auction of goods from the collection.
“It was a struggle from start-to-finish with judges and lawyers,” says Colin Stair. “All of the legal proceedings are over now, and since Mr. Salander is obviously in a tough position, the property needs to be sold by June 15th.”
Originally, the Salander - O’Reilly Gallery was located in a grand East 79th Street townhouse, and represented American artists, including Robert DeNiro, Sr. and Stone Roberts. “That was the focus of the gallery,” says Carey Maloney of the M (Group), a New York City-based interior design firm. “When, in 2005, they moved to an even grander townhouse (trust me – it is a palace) on East 71st Street, the stock became vast. Antiquities, Titians, Constables, Bernini benches, alongside DeNiros and Roberts? Uber-expensive old masters, furniture, rugs, objets, with some American artists incongruously thrown into the mix? It seemed overly ambitious and wildly unfocused.”
Obviously, it was. But as a consequence, the variety at the bankruptcy auction is impressive, everything from chimneypieces to garden nymphs and putti, from garden gates and water troughs to a signed Austin & Seeley 8 1/2 ft. fountain with a merman blowing a conch shell, while seated in a shell basin atop entwined dolphins. Among the offerings is a large group (approximately 90 lots) of architectural ornaments, primarily from the collection of Michael Roberts, of Ashurst, Kent, a pioneer in that field. Salander spent over $1M for the collection at a Christie’s (London) auction in September 2004. The English Art Deco wrought-iron gate (top) that sold at Christies for $32,317.59 four years ago is estimated to fetch between $10,000 - $15,000 at Stair.
“An auction of garden ornaments and architectural artifacts of this quality is rare,” says M (Group)’s Hermes Mallea. “For a phalanx of lawyers to choose Stair Galleries for the liquidation is a testament to the auction house’s success.”
Of particular interest is a pair of terracotta urns with snake-form handles (left) attributed to Mark Henry Blanchard who, after apprenticing with Eleanor Coade, set up his own operation in 1839. The buff shade of these urns suggest that they were made in his early years of production, as his later work was darker in color. There is also an excellent sampling of Coade stone ranging from1791 to 1820, as well as pieces by other famous makers, such as J&M Craig and the Compton Pottery.
Also on offer is a group of fine 17th - 19th-century furniture, including a mid-18th century rococo painted and giltwood console table and an excellent assortment of frames. The furniture from mid- to-late-17th-century is especially strong.
Lots stored at the Warren Street gallery can be viewed up to and including the day of the sale. Other merchandise, including approximately two-thirds of the garden material, is at Stair’s storage facility in Claverack, where it may be previewed by appointment.
Asked what he intends to bid on, Mallea said, “I can’t give away our plans, but I will say that signed Coade stone urns are a rarity. We cannot pass those up without a fight.”
Preview: Stair Galleries; Monday - Friday 9 - 5; Saturday 11 - 5; Sunday 12 - 5
The Grainary, 83 Old Lane, Claverack; by appointment only
Sale at Stair Galleries, 549 Warren Street, Hudson; 518.751.1000
Saturday, June 7, beginning at 11
Posted by Marilyn Bethany on 05/28/08 at 08:36 AM • Permalink
There’s Shopping, then There’s Shopping
From rustic to rarified, Foley Cox HOME: a mix of re-imagined antiques and luxury accessories
Behind every good store, there’s an artful shopper. Most home furnishings stores in our region, for example, select their stock from the furniture market at High Point, NC and from the vendors at various trade shows at the Javits Center in New York. In other words, the same stuff is available to everyone; the art is in the selection process. The better retailers, of course, develop exclusive resources with crafts people and antiques pickers, but, for convenience sake, these tend to be fairly local.
At Foley & Cox HOME, a store that opened just this week on Warren Street, they do things differently. Foley-Cox is a highly regarded New York-based interior-design team. But before forming a design partnership, Mary Foley and Michael Cox graduated from the Ralph Lauren School of Shopping and Set Design, where they finished at the top of the class.
Ever since he began creating his Home Collection in the early ‘80s, Ralph Lauren has fielded a team of world-class scavengers whose job is to circle the globe with more-or-less open budgets, buying stuff the way you and I would wheel a cart around a supermarket. Consequently, anyone who travels and enjoys shopping has had the following experience: You’re in a shop in an remote region of an obscure country. Maybe you arrived by camel. Through a translator, the owner, shaking his head with regret, tells you, it’s too bad you didn’t get here last week. Someone from Ralph Lauren was in and bought all his best things. (Why does Ralph Lauren need so much stuff? Inspiration.)
So when Mary Foley says, “The store gives us the opportunity to take advantage of all the wonderful craftspeople, artisans and resources we have discovered around the world, and share them with a wider public,” she’s not kidding.
The Immaculate Gardener: Culti’s tool set; $495
Foley & Cox HOME
317 Warren Street; Hudson 518 828-3210
Thursday - Monday, 11 - 6 and by appointment
Posted by Marilyn Bethany on 05/23/08 at 07:39 AM • Permalink
Many States, Many Styles: Easy, Affordable & Fun
Everyone loves this antiques show—serious collectors, dabblers, dealers. Close to 200 of the latter, some specializing in the fun and affordable, others more serious, will gather this weekend at the Dutchess County Fairgrounds, as their kind have for the past 30 Memorial Days, rain or shine (it’s indoors). “The whole thing is fun and approachable, but there’s real quality, too,” says Sandy Klempner, of the eponymous Canaan, NY shop, who has a booth (above) at the show. “I always find things to buy.” Little wonder. The cream of the Hudson Valley and New England are there, as are top-notch dealers from Ohio, Missouri, Kentucky, Michigan and North Carolina, to name but a few of the far-flung states represented. And to make sure things go smoothly, the crack management team here has all the kinks worked out—the dealers are varied and well-vetted, the food vendors likewise; shipping facilities are on the premises, and the system for coordinating purchases from multiple vendors so they all end up in the right car? Nothing short of miraculous.
The Rhinebeck Antiques Fair
Dutchess Country Fairgrounds, Route 9, Rhinebeck; 845.876.1989
Saturday, May 24, 10 – 5; Sunday, May 25, 11 – 4.
Ancram Preservation Group’s 9th Annual Memorial Day Tag Sale
Held at the singular and enchanting Simon’s General Store, now sufficiently restored to be on the market itself, this APG fundraiser is, on the one hand, just a tag sale with the usual $.25 basket and mix of lots of cute and cheap stuff with a few nicer, more expensive things. On the other hand, the event is the stuff of tag-sale legend. But it’s APG board member and vice-president Abby Westlake’s story; let her tell it:
“Some years ago, on the last day of the sale, I was looking at the things that hadn’t yet sold. There was a picture that I thought was a print, but when I took it down, I realized it was an oil, a smallish landscape with a signature on the bottom, George Smillie N.A. Well I know what N.A. stands for: National Academy. So I called my good friend and neighbor, Carol Smillie, and before I could get the words out, she was down there. Her ancestors, the painters James and George Smillie, a father and son, were members of the Hudson River School. Carol bought the painting for the full asking price, $75. We never did find out who had contributed it.”
Simon’s General Store
Routes 82 & 7 (at the blinking light), Ancram
Early bird wine and cheese party: Friday, May 23, 6 – 8; $25 ($15 for members)
Sale: Saturday & Sunday 10 - 4
And this just in....
Kinderhook Antiques Center dealer Eliza Woodward, who has amazing taste, has asked a fellow dealer and three stylish friends to join her in a NO JUNK tag sale. This big, quality sale features vintage furniture (not real antiques, but interesting stuff), books, old tools, LPs, videos, TVs, ski equipment, bikes, pictures, frames, and vintage clothing and jewelry. Stock will be replenished daily.
The field next to the Rigor Hill Diner
Rigor Hill Road at the Taconic State Parkway, Ghent
Friday - Monday, May 23 - 26, 10 - 5
Posted by Marilyn Bethany on 05/19/08 at 01:57 PM • Permalink
Trade Secrets Returns This Weekend
A display at Trade Secrets 2007; photograph by Lisa Sheble
Trade Secrets is not such a secret anymore. Like a well-tended garden, the rare plant and garden antiques sale grows lusher and more interesting every year, raising ever more money for Women’s Support Services, the not-for-profit agency that provides aid to victims of domestic violence in northwestern Connecticut and nearby New York and Massachusetts. “It’s gratifying to see how it’s become a major event on gardeners’ calendars,” says Naomi Blumenthal of Alford, who helped found Trade Secrets in 2001 at interior designer Bunny Williams‘s property in Falls Village, CT, where she was then head gardener. Trade Secrets is both earthy and elegant—it has the ambiance of the sort of country fair you’d see featured in an English gardening magazine. For the third year in a row, it will be held at Lion’s Rock Farm on Route 41 on the Sharon/Salisbury border. The 50 vendors take great care not only with the merchandise they choose to bring but also with composing the vignettes in their tented booths. “We love participating in Trade Secrets—it’s an annual reunion of passionate plantspeople and experts who we know and admire,” says Bob Hyland of Loomis Creek Nursery. Indeed, Trade Secret veterans “love to reminisce about the second Trade Secrets at Bunny’s house when it snowed,” says Blumenthal. “If I could wish for anything it would be for good weather.”
But cold, wind and rain never deter competitive gardeners like Anne Bass, Carolyne Roehm, Martha Stewart, Oscar de la Renta, and Bunny Williams, who are usually among the early buyers and who ask probing questions of vendors such as David Burdick Daffodils and Glendale Botanicals. You can also shop for country antiques (from dealers such as Dawn Hill and Treillage), rare garden tomes (from Johnnycake Books), handmade clay pots (by Guy Wolff), and outdoor sculpture (from The White Gallery and Battle Hill Forge). The planning committee is especially excited about a new vendor, Barbara Israel, who many consider the authority on antique garden ornaments.
Day Two of Trade Secrets is devoted to garden tours. “We have four this year,” says co-chair Judith Linscott. “Bunny Williams’s garden is always included because it is beloved. People just love going back to it again and again. In Salisbury, there’s Robin Magowan’s rock garden and the grand Twin Maples and Helen Bodian’s wonderful woodlands in Millerton. There’s a realistic element to all these gardens, so you can borrow ideas. You don’t need $10 million and three full-time gardeners to emulate them.”
Trade Secrets
Saturday May 17
Early Buying: 8 AM to 10 AM, $100 (includes buffet breakfast)
Regular Admission: 10 AM - 3 PM, $35
Sunday May 18
Garden Tours: 10 AM - 4 PM, $60 ($50 if purchased in advance)
Posted by Dan Shaw on 05/10/08 at 08:07 PM • Permalink
Privet House: A Shopping “Revolution” in Warren, CT
Scented candles from France are kept under bell jars
If shopping is your recreational drug of choice, then Richard Lambertson and Suzanne Cassano are the dealers of your dreams. Last week, they opened Privet House, which they call an emporium of home goods, antiques and curiosities. They have artfully displayed a wide assortment of things—from antique calligraphy brushes to hotel silver—that you might expect to find on the Seventh Floor of Bergdorf Goodman in New York (where Lambertson was once the fashion director) but not in sleepy Warren, CT (which is on the way to Cornwall, Kent or New Preston, depending on your orientation.)
Cassano has been running Vol 1 Antiques next door for several years, and she was tired of having an empty store as a neighbor. “Selfishly, I told Richard he should open a shop there, because I thought it would bring me more traffic,” she says. “And he said to me, ‘Only if you do it with me’.” The next thing you know, the two (who both have homes in Sharon) were off to Europe, ordering white earthenware in Belgium, scouring the Paris flea market for objets d’art, and having notebooks made with marbelized paper in Florence. They also brought back Cire Trudon candles that they display under bell jars so that the elaborate scents don’t collide and overwhelm the senses. ("Lift the glass and smell it, not the candle” instructs the manager Claudia Kalur.” ) Made by a French firm that’s been around since the 17th century, the candles have poetic backstories and esoteric names such as “Odalisque” (“Enclosed in citrus and wood bar, the orange blossom weaves a painter’s dream from which escapes the pale volute of smoke from a narghile”) and “Revolution” (“Smells of hot and crusty bread right out of the oven, an exulting scent; this wake of hope is ‘the other side of happiness,’ just like a provocation, or a liberal urge moved by childish appetite.”) I guess you might say that Privet House is a “revolutionary” store—at least for northwestern Connecticut.
Privet House
4 Cornwall Road, Warren CT; 860-868-1800
Friday - Sunday 11 AM - 5 PM or by appointment
The shop specializes in dramatic oversized objects like the carved 18th century wooden eagle from England ($16,500) and copper-beaded chandelier ($3,300) .
Privet House is like a primer on how to display disparate objects such as a set of four vintage cutlery molds ($695) and bisque candelabras ($550 each) with pieces of coral and shells.
A shelf of antique calligraphy pens and French masonry jars.
One corner of the shop resembles anold world potting shed with Chinese paper mache pots on the top shelf ($85 and $150).
The canvas dog carrier ($120) is ideal for anyone who travels with a pet on MetroNorth. The doggie rainbreaker ($56) is sold separately.
