Shopping Heaven – Brevard, NC

A couple of weeks ago I posted about driving over the mountain to Brevard, NC to meet up with Mod Betty from Retro Roadmap.  In the comments, Hollis mentioned that she’s been wanting to get to Brevard, and it reminded me that I really needed to do that myself.  Though the town is close to me, it’s a roundabout trip to get there due to the mountains, so I tend to neglect visiting as often as I should.  But I did make time last week, and I’ve now determined that I must get over there much more often.

Brevard is a small town of around 7600 people, though the population is higher in the summer when the summer residents are there.  The town really benefited several years ago when it was named in one of the first surveys of great places to retire, and so today it is thought of as a retirement town.  As any good thrifter will tell you, thrifting is best in affluent communities.  Many of the retirees are affluent, and they have time on their hands, and so there are quite a few privately run thrift stores for local charities.  It makes for a very good shopping experience.

The town has two antique malls, and several other stores with booths, some of which have old stuff.  There are vintage clothes scattered around, mixed in with newer wares.

If I were a knitter, I might have wanted this little charmer as a mascot.

Paris and fashion and the early 1960s.

And while the antique malls are fun, where Brevard really excites is in the thrifts.

Yes, I bought this 1920s Whiting and Davis bag in a thrift store.  I did not get it for $2, or anything crazy like that, but the price was far under what it would have been at an antique store, and the thing is in almost perfect condition, right down to the silk lining.

Another store down the street had this copy of Elsa Schiaparelli’s Shocking Life.  I already had a copy, but mine is rough, and without the dust jacket.  So I bought this one and will be giving the old copy away in January, so stay tuned if you are in need of that book.

I’m always in the market for some Cecil Beaton, so the first volume of his Diaries was a real find.  I also picked up Oleg Cassini’s autobiography, a 1933 copy of Fortune magazine that features the emerging New York fashion design scene, some 1950s sales brochures from an Asheville department store, Bon Marche,  and a 1983 Vogue.

I was so excited that I finally understood the rush that leads to youtube “haul” videos.  Okay, I exaggerate a bit, but I was a very happy shopper.