My Stone aka. Marble Fruit and Country Living Magazine: Part 2,

Several readers emailed and asked me to post the article about my Vintage Marble Fruit in Country Living Magazine.

So here it is from Country Living Magazine, November 2001. It is from the front of the magazine where Country Living features collections.

You can click on the picture, and you might be able to read the article.

Google knows Stone Fruit as Marble Fruit so I am using both terms in this post.

Google says Stone Fruit~ American Country antiques dealers say Stone Fruit. They are the same thing.





A couple of notes about the photos. All the fruit is Vintage Stone Fruit.

The pear slice is a rare oversize "Split" in Vintage Stone Fruit vernacular.

The chickens are handmade wooden weather vanes from the top of a farm shed. The shed was on one of the last farms in the town of Lake Forest. The farm was sold and divided in the early 1990's.

The yellow bowls are old yellow ware.~ another of my collections. The fruit and these bowls are on a 1790's blue pewter cupboard.


Next I will be showing you more photos from my collection. And I will be sharing some photos from my readers of their collections.
Do you have any questions about Stone/Marble Fruit?

Cherries! Cherries! Cherries! They are not what you think.

They are stone cherries, which are actually Italian marble fruit. In the antiques business and among collectors they are know as stone fruit. Long time readers of my blog may recall that I collect stone fruit. I have over 300 pieces and have probably sold at least a 100 more over the last 25 years.

My first purchase of stone fruit was a bowl's worth I found in the "treasure room" at a church rummage sale in Kennilworth, Illinois. I remember that moment like it was yesterday. I was hooked. Those 15 pieces of stone fruit were the MOST expensive I ever bought.



In a conversation at the show last weekend one of my customers mentioned stone cherries and asked if I might have any "extras" I might want to sell.

So yesterday morning I started hunting around and found these bunches of cherries. I keep my stone fruit in a variety of wooden, ironstone, and yellowware bowls around the house.




Off went their pictures and now they will be moving to another Chicago suburb where they will begin a new life with another collector. She is in love with stone cherries and is on a mission to fill a bowl. Won't a whole bowl of cherries look great?




My stone fruit is featured in a book called Jessie Walker's Country Decorating and in the the November, 2001 issue of Country Living Magazine on page 32.

Country Living Magazine and My Stone Fruit

If I am known for anything it is my collection of Stone Fruit. My collection was featured in Country Living Magazine in November 2001. Later it was featured in the wonderful book Jessie Walker's Country Decorating.

So I was thrilled this week to find some additional pieces.



Stone Fruit was.... and still is... made in Italy.




It isn't really stone... rather it is marble.




First made around 1900 it is often shown with other "Country" decorations...




But, the heyday of it's popularity was the 1950's when it was used with other Italian decorating items...cream colored furniture, gilt mirrors, marble lamps, and tole.




I am drawn to the wonderful colors, great paint surface, and robust presence!

More about Stone Fruit in my next post.

Curious Collector

Here are some photos from the book Curious Collector that featured some of my collections.



A group shot of part of my metal flower frog collection...{many of these have since been sold and have happy, new homes}.



These pictures were also used for an article about my metal flower frog collection in Romantic Homes {September, 2001}.



A corner of a shelf showing part of my nested, wooden apple collection. These were toys ~ first made in Germany and later in Japan.



Several pictures of my marble fruit collection, usually called "stone fruit" by collectors. It was made in Italy starting in the early 1900's..was most popular in the 1950's. They were made as tourist items and then later imported into the US.

This is my largest collection. I have been collecting "stone fruit" {always at a bargain price} for over 20 years. I have over 300 pieces including oversized, undersized pieces and several rare vegetables.

A few of my favorite things~ Lovingly collected and letting go.

I sold all the wire glove stretchers from my old blog header.

Tomorrow is the First Anniversary of my online shop, anythinggoeshere.etsy.

And in anticipation of the coming second year,

I have been taking a look back at the first.

Several dozens of my Italian stone fruit are out the door.

And one of my reasons for opening an online shop

was to sell items from my personal, long-time collections.

My favorite glass terrarium is living in California.

This has worked out really well because I get to decide

"piece by piece" when it is time for something to go.

After I enjoyed this decoration on the front door last fall

I listed it, and off it went.

Both of my vintage Phrenology heads

are living in other parts of the country.

I am getting  close to not having any vintage garden tools~

something I collected for over 20 years.

When cleaning off a shelf in one of the bedrooms

I realized I was never going to collect any more vintage Easter

so this guy went to live with dozens of others like him.

This old bug started to bug me

so now he is bugging someone else.

Making a clean sweep of a desk, this armillary had to go.

As a regular reader of my blog, you know the whole story of brushes,

brushes and more brushes getting multiple new homes.

Loved this religious piece, but again knew it was never going to become

a collection so it is now living in Pennsylvania with someone who

does collect them.

This part of my "Museum of Measurement" left in the clean=off of the above mentioned desk.

Thank you so much for a wonderful first year of selling at

anythinggoeshere.etsy.

And a special Thank You to everyone who has given new homes to

things from my personal collections.

For the love of a lamp, I can be reduced to begging.

Just a hint! Never be the driver when you are Estate Sale shopping with your competitive antiques dealer buddies. While you are parking the car they are buying everything worth having!!!!!

That is what happened to me years ago and the chickens in the picture below were involved. By the time I got TO the Estate Sale my friends were already leaving~ one of them with these chickens in his hot little hands. The chicken are a lamp! A lamp I LOVED. I am sure HE got the lamp at a great price, but I had to HAVE it and was reduced to BEGGING!

I have never been sorry that I bought it from him {I don't even remember what the price was}, but I NEVER drove my competition around again!




In the background of the photo is one of my old oil paintings of fruit. Another collection. I have several oil fruit paintings of various qualities~ this one is probably the best.




The little sleeping pig is a ceramic bank. I have a couple ceramic piggy-banks. He is the cutest.




Here is a closer look. The money slot is on his back. He doesn't have any money in him. If he did, it would be staying there because the only way to get it out would be to break him. Can you imagine? What a waste of a darling little guy.




These are plaster-like eggs inside an old general store jar. The eggs are what I have always called "hen-encouragers." After farmers took the real eggs they replaced them with "fake" eggs. The idea was to encourage the hens to continue laying more eggs. I don't know if it worked or not. I don't think farmers do it anymore. I have owned and sold old "hen-encouragers" in ceramic, glass, and wood.




This is another old general store jar with a tin lid. This one has some bay leaves, nest stuff, real dried eggs and oranges in it. These old tin-lidded glass general store jars are the only kind I collect/keep. I have a nice collection of general store jars now, and have never had them for sale. Anymore you only see them at better country antiques shows/shops. I haven't seen one for sale at an Estate Sale in years. The last one I found didn't even have a lid, but I bought it anyway.

There have been several versions of this type of jar reproduced, but the originals have handmade tin tops, are made of hand blown glass or old molded glass with seam lines. They are always clear glass that does NOT have a bluish tint.

All of these things are sitting on an old green storage cupboard that I bought in a Wisconsin shop. It was part of an Estate of a country collector whose family didn't like "Country" furniture. Goody, for me.

I continue dusting. I mean I am REALLY dusting~ I am taking everything off the surfaces, dusting and rearranging. So far it has been very rewarding.... it has literally been years since I have done this. I will keep dusting and photographing and sharing for as long as my allergies can stand it. Or if you can't stand it anymore!!!

I will know you have had it when my follower and visitor numbers start dropping like a stone. You could tell me to cut it out if you want to before that happens though.