Tales of the Traveling Tote #26: Antiquing, and Giveaway

Welcome to the Tales of the Traveling Tote #26, and Happy March! Our tales began in 2015 (go here to get the story behind it all), and here we are in 2021, still journaling our tales each quarter. You can go here for my personal travel history with my totes, Miss Luna C and Miss Charley C.

Probably the most significant trips I've made in this past quarter are two outings for the COVID vaccine. That's both me and Mr. P. pictured below (and Miss Charley C), getting our second shots in the latter part of February, almost one year since the pandemic began. BREAK OUT! We are now counting the days until we can feel a little more relaxed to eat out, shop in person, and actually travel! Let's just hope these vaccines will be effective against variants.

Most of my readers know one of my favorite pre-COVID activities was antiquing and vintage shopping. My two Panoply sisters and I have rented spaces in the South Charleston Antique Mall since July, 2008 in WV. The 3-story (+mezzanine), 18,000 square foot building (pictured below) was formerly a retail department clothing store in its heyday. Now its purpose is an antique emporium!

Since my travels during the past year have involved little more than my [mostly] weekly trips to the antique mall to restock and fluff our booth spaces, I thought it might be fun to have Miss Luna C take you along for a mini tour of our antique mall. I'll share several of our dealers' spaces, and give you a look at our current spaces as they're styled for early spring. Miss Luna C was excited for this excursion, and I hope you are too!

Our starting point on first floor is the corner of one of our spaces. We'll circle back at the end of our trip to see more of our spaces.

Still on first floor, we go to the far back and find one of our favorite dealer friend's booths. She buys a lot of big furniture, as you will see in another photo. Miss Luna C sits on an English washstand in the corner.

More of the same dealer's goods, let's see what's cooking (besides Miss Luna C in the large apple butter kettle!). Crates, curios, brass beds, large stained glass windows......

Pictured below is some of the really big furniture this dealer hauls in. Look at that massive secretary and corner cabinet. My sisters and I don't sell large furniture like this, and we never did. We now limit furniture items to what may fit in an SUV.

Moving up the stairs to the mezzanine level, this cigar store Native American is on the lookout for good deals. 

Ahh, yes, just up a few more stairs to second floor, we see a dealer who sells all things Fiesta, which is manufactured in West Virginia. 

This was late February, so he had already made green the starring color, but just around the corner of this aisle display, there was still a bit of red and white for Valentine's Day. He switches his color scheme displays monthly, and stocks more colors on the racks behind these. 

Miss Luna C wants some rock and roll. This dealer stocks an excellent variety of vintage vinyl LPs.

This dealer nearby has a vintage library with a couple chairs for customers to peruse the inventory.

A West Virginia antique mall without vintage glassware would be like a candy store without candy. Blenko, Viking, Kanawha, Rainbow, Fenton - they're all in our antique mall. Check out these fun facts on this iconic WV artistry on the state's Tourism website. We have several dealers who sell vintage glass.

On the third floor of our antique mall, we have a dealer who caters to us dish lovers! Check out that Windsor Ware harvest fruit in the cabinet! There was a beautiful china set on the table too which I hurriedly walked past without taking a photo. It had a pink rim and roses.

This booth has a nice set of chairs hanging on the wall. That's a trick we often use (and are currently doing in one of our spaces!). Those barrister bookcases like the one on the floor below the chairs are consistently hot commodities at auction, estate sales and even antique malls. It won't last long here.

Coming back downstairs to first floor, we'll make one more stop, right next to my sisters' and my booth. This dealer specializes in postcards. Miss Luna C is propped up on the section of travel postcards.

I promised a few photos of our booths as they are currently styled, so the rest of the photos you will see are of mine and my sisters' rented spaces. This first space is what we refer to as our main booth. It's directly beside the dealer with the postcards.

Not pictured in the photo above, but barely visible on the right are one, double-sided rack of our vintage linens.

Directly behind the right side louvered dividers of our main booth is our mall's service elevator, and the aisle turns right. If you think of the floor layout as shaped like a U, we would be situated at the base of that U. You'll perhaps have a better idea of that as I show the additional spaces. We have a space directly beside the elevator. We refer to this section as our "mantiques". The guys (and gals, too) gravitate toward it.

Directly across the aisle from mantiques is yet another space. This space is sort of a mixture of vintage  country/farmhouse/primitive items, seen below. Through the shelf and louvered shutter divider at center, you can see the staircase that leads to the mall's upper floors.

See the backside of the lamps on the right? Here's the front of that table (picture below), which is on that aisle that turned right from the service elevator I mentioned earlier. 

Lastly, we end up where we started this mini antiquing adventure, at our space on the corner of another aisle, at the foot of the staircase. From here, you can look back all the way to our mantiques section. It's one continuum, with a left turn at mantiques taking you to our main booth. 

Behind the repurposed chifferobe pictured on the corner above, we have the space behind it also. The wall is pictured below. There's that chair I mentioned we hung on the wall. We work around space restrictions such as the HVAC system ductwork, and optimize what space we have.

I know that was a whirlwind tour, particularly of Panoply's own spaces, but I want you to now read about our giveaway and take some time to visit my tote tribe sisters! I'll try to show our antique booth spaces in more product detail in a future post. We have a lot of fun inventory, both vintage and antique.

NOW, ONTO THE GIVEAWAY!

(Update March 8, 2021: Barb at the Sewing Knit Loft was randomly chosen as our winner by Jackie Williamson. Thank you to all who left comment entries!)

The Traveling Totes Tribe is offering another giveaway and Jackie at Purple Chocolat Home is our giveaway sponsor this time. One lucky reader who leaves a comment on Jackie's post today will have their name thrown into the hat for an opportunity to win this MacKenzie-Childs Tulip Tea Kettle Dish Towel. This is a perfect accessory for welcoming spring in your kitchen! 

Be sure to check out my other traveling sisters' posts to see what they've been up to during these past few winter months.

Debbie with Miss Aurora @ Mountain Breaths

Emily with Miss Courtney Childs@ The French Hutch

Patti with Miss Kenzie and Miss Taylor @ Pandora's Box

Jenna with Miss Coquille @ The Painted Apron

Linda P with Miss Lola @ Life and Linda

Rita with Miss Luna C @ Panoply (you are here!)

Sarah with Miss Merri Mac @ Hyacinths for the Soul

Jackie with Miss Madi K @ Purple Chocolat Home

Ricki Jill and Countess de Monet @The Sketchy Reader

Join us again on June 1, 2021 for another edition of the Tales of the Traveling Tote. I'm dreaming of a real vacation!

Thanks so much for your visit. I love reading your comments, and be sure to leave one on Jackie's blog for a chance at our token gift. Stay safe, and Happy March!

Rita C. at Panoply

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