Featuring two sides, one to toast the year about to end and the other to toast the new year once it arrives, these glasses were made to usher in the new millennium in 2000. I don’t usually collect glassware this new but these are so odd and New Yearsish as to become Kitsch.
Happy last day of 2009 and I’ll see you on the other side!
Completely oversized for the two light switches it’s designed to decorate, this textured fake wood plastic switch plate adorned many a wall in the 1970s, with any luck a wood paneled or flocked wallpaper covered one for optimum viewing pleasure. Light switches are usually designed to be only slightly larger than the hole in the wall they’re meant to cover but this Andre The Giant of one stretches to 7″ to accommodate a flower pot sprouting a completely overgrown freak of nature sunflower plant with multiple blooms.
Plastic chef kitchen aids were all the rage in the 1950’s. Most popular among the S&P’s, note pad holders and mixing spoon hangers were these double spoon Jolly Chef spoon rests. In the postwar leisure class spending fury that modernized kitchens all over the world no one wanted their Eggplant Parmesan, Beef Stroganoff or Campbell’s Tomato Soup dripping on their new Okeefe & Merritt so the population of these little guys exploded. Of course, many a noxious fume mixed with the cooking smells as spoon rest after spoon rest melted from sitting too close to a burner. So finding one of these in mint condition is a fantastic gastronomical find. This guy has a scarred lip from a tragic spaghetti accident.
Made by Reliance in the USA, the original paper label on this 6″ x 5″ Jolly Chef reads “Heat resistant Styrene. Keeps Stove Top Clean…Attractive Wall Plaque product.” His chef’s hat has a hole for convenient hanging in case you want to keep him out of harm’s way.
My favorite Sundays are when I entertain and this golf ball corkscrew has been held in the hands of almost every brunch guest who’s ever been over here. It’s as close as anyone will get to a golf course around here as the only use I have for golf balls and clubs are as bar accessories as seen here or as found objects in my art and sculptures. Like this series of Arnold Palmer Golf Hat & Coat Racks I made in 1987.
Judging by the vast number of both vintage and new bar accessories that incorporate golf equipment I’d say the liquor industry has to be pretty happy with this sport!
Only 5″ long and less than 1″ high, this solid brass puppy weighs a ton. For years he sat on my desk atop my most important notes, making me less resentful of going through the stacks of papers he kept in place while I procrastinated going through them every day. One day he fell on the floor and I noticed how strangely shaped his little feet were. Only then, after almost 20 years of being a paper protector, did I realize the dachshund was, in fact, a bottle cap opener on his front legs and a can opener in the rear.
Discoveries like this make me very happy. It seems like I have a brand-new object in the house! He’s definitely hand sculpted – be careful around his sharp butt! – but his polished smooth body makes him very fun to handle and easy to operate. I do miss him guarding my papers but he seems much happier in his new and more exciting role.
The first thing I do on Sunday mornings is to brew a reallllly strong cup of coffee, well, decaf, and set about trying to knock out all the tasks I know will make the coming week much easier if they’re not piled up and waiting for me Monday morning. This big bull cup holds twice as much as a normal coffee cup and I’ve used it so much I almost look at it as my pet.
The cup looks somewhere between mass-produced and handmade, only one coat of glaze on the lettering – as a ceramicist myself I can tell you this comes from pure laziness – as well as parts of the bull being a little lumpier than he should be. No manufacturing marks anywhere so who knows? I just know I’m a pretty good bull thrower myself and lifting this cup puts a smile on my lips whether bull’s coming out of them or not.
I don’t have to tell any self-respecting Kitsch lover about the Parthenon of Kitsch, the Madonna Inn, in San Luis Obispo, California. Appearing like a mirage off the 101, its customized-to-the-brink-of-insanity rooms, pink, pink, pink dining room, not to mention the cheeseburgers and sprinkle cookies in the coffee shop attract me like a magnet whenever I drive up north. Besides, the bathrooms are nutty and always add that extra dimension to a rest stop. The place has such magic powers that any smoke rising from this ashtray is probably pink.
I love my bedroom but there’s no doubt that using this ashtray in the Barrel Of Fun, Canary Cottage, Cave Man, Daisy Mae, Edelweiss, Jungle Rock, Matterhorn, Oriental Fantasy, Time Of Your Life, Wilhelm Tell or any of the other 110 rooms enhances the desired Kitsch effect. To see all of them go here.
Not sure exactly what blend Tony Whan stashed inside when he made Murray Yunkers this jar featuring a removable chef’s cap with holes in it but it’s awfully cute and practical whatever contents it was made for. Though it would seem like a special blend, be it coffee, tea, snuff or whatever, would want to be in something airtight so the holes in the top don’t make much sense.
Maybe it was for something like sugar, flour or grated cheese but there’s no way of securing the hat when the chef is turned over so that makes no sense either.
Standing 9″ high and looking somewhere between professionally made and a lumpy school project, it’s signed “Stole” on the bottom, which also makes no sense seeing as the cap clearly says it was made by Tony Whan. Perhaps Tony “stole” the bottom part from “Stole” and only made the top.
I guess Tony Whan was in his own little world making something special for Murray Yunkers and I guess I’ll never know what exactly it was made to hold but I’m happy I have this happy little chef to make me think about both of them every time I walk in my kitchen.
With as many taco trucks as I eat off of and as many meals as I eat in my car, my favorite dining room of all, I can tell you that the Spork, a spoon, fork and knife in one, is one of those indispensable instruments of life that comes in handy time and time again. And just like another modern-day marvel, the Snuggie, it’s both practical and kitschy, the penultimate combination in contemporary Kitsch.
Made in Sweden by Light My Fire, the Spork is heat resistant, “Teflon ready” (whatever that means – isn’t it either Teflon or not?!) and machine washable.
I hope to never be without my Spork.
I found this trashcan for 99¢ at a thrift shop in Santa Barbara, CA. and it’s been the proud receptacle of Willis waste ever since. I often stare at the illustrations of perfume atomizers, combs, compacts and other elegantly sketched artifacts that comprise a typical female’s cosmetic regime, loving more each time the absolutely perfect 1950’s color combination of white, pink, gold and black as applied to the metal.
Made by Harvell and standing 13″ tall x 10-3/4″ wide, a lot of the paint has scraped off this baby but as far as I’m concerned she just gets prettier with age.
