Grayslake and Grandville

Some of our new spring handmades are inspired by the work of 19th-century French illustrator J.J. Grandville.

Grandville was a caricaturist who is best known for his pictures that combined animal and human forms. Having run into renewed censorship of caricature in the 1830s, Grandville turned his talents to the illustration of children's books. This is where we ran into him, almost 200 years later, in a page from "The White Blackbird," by Alfred de Musset, which we purchased from paper dealer Patty Suttle at a recent show.

We'd been planning to feature birds in our some of our spring creations and felt an homage to Grandville would fit right in! The collages pictured were used to create trays, which we offered for sale at this weekend's Grayslake Antique Market. The trickiest part of creating the collages was finding birds' heads that would fit the bodies we had available. In addition, we wanted the birds' faces to look "friendly," which also turned out to be a little difficult. Turns out many of the birds we looked at seemed a little cross -- who knew!

We were pleased that the projects were well received! The show turned out to be our busiest to date for 2010. Sold furniture, both large and small, as well as smalls in all categories, industrial and garden. Many thanks to all of the wonderful customers who turned out to support the show! It's always great to catch up with you. Today, we start work on Wheaton. Plan to join us and take home a little Grandville for yourself! xo