Last Chance Thrift Find

I must have gone past the marquee announcing the church rummage sale for Friday, March 16 and Saturday, March 17, a hundred times and every time I went past the sign I would read it and count the days until the sale. Of course, I planned to attend early on Friday and grab the goodies. Church rummage sales are my favorite kind of thrift sales.

Well, Friday came and went and so did half of Saturday before I remembered the sale. Off I went, with no expectations of finding anything that I would be interested in.

My heart sank as I entered the hall, long banquet tables were heaped with tangled clothing items that no one wanted, shoes out of style were strewn about with the matching shoe nowhere to be found. For one quick second, I thought about turning around and leaving without looking.

As I strolled past the banquet tables piled high with the unwanted out of date clothing, and mismatched shoes I came upon a card table that held a few books, and that's where I saw this large coffee table book with the most unusual title and tatter dust jacket.

The graphic and the raised sliver font ERTE piqued my curiosity, so I decided to take a closer look. I have the unusual habit, of starting from the back of books and magazines when I glance at pages, my eyes could not believe the beautiful images as I flipped through this book. 

I paid 25¢ for this coffee table book, the inside flap of the dust jacket has the price listed as $75.00, was printed 1991 in Italy.  This book contains 176 full color illustrations by Erte.

The second thing I did after sitting down for 20 minutes looking at all of the magnificent illustrations was to google Erte. 

Erte was a talented 20th century artist and designer who excelled in many different fields, fashion, jewelry, graphics arts, costume and set design for opera, theater and films.

Born in 1892 to a wealthy family in St. Petersburg, Russia was Romain de Tirtoff, who at the age of 18 changed his name to Erte. Erte created over 200 Harper Bazaar covers featuring his Art Deco style. This exceptionally talented artist/designer died in 1990 at the age of 97.

I look forward to reading and learning more about this talented man, Erte.

Here, are a few photos from the book 

"ERTE the Last Works  Graphics Sculpture."

The Balcony

Cosmetic Palette

Paris Boutique 

Printemps 

Rose Gown

Motherhood
notice how they are tethered to the mother's waist ribbon 

Summer/Winter

Onyx Sleeve

Ribbon Dress

I would love to have a shorter version of the bracelet titled Onyx sleeve, I'll have to check Etsy.

I am linking up:

 

Apron Thrift Girl, Thrift Share Monday

Me and My Shadow, Magpie Monday