Thursday, January 28, 2010

Whimsical Leather: Not Your Usual Post

I had decided not to post this piece, but in the last half hour, there have been signs telling me to do so. 

For instance, I opened up my latest GOOP to find no less than three mentions of pork.  And then I opened up my linen drawer, in search of a vintage Moroccan tobacco box, and discovered my first fabric baby toy: a small velvet pig still in fine condition (but with a new tail).  So I'll let this one fly: it's something a little different.

*  *  * 

Before I loved bulldogs, I had a crush on pigs. 

Lovely, pink, clean, sweet-tempered pigs, the kind that would live in enchanted meadows and didn't know the meaning of slop.  Bulldogs, with their dear scrunched noses and jolly snorts, reminded me of these idealized pigs, and I raised two of them, each for ten glorious years.

After bulldogs came human children and I forgot all about pigs, though I gave my eldest daughter an enormous, angelically fluffy, soft pig toy with dainty, pink leather hooves that had been mine during, well, university.  Undergraduate.  I packed it away for grad school.

Today, browsing the NYT House and Home section online, I came across these charming bookends in the "desirable" design-item section.  Handcrafted by New York State resident Sandy Vohr (the NYT misspells her name), these porcine bookends are at once substantial and whimsical. 

The LA shop quoted by the NYT has sold out of them, but you can find other boutiques selling these online and can also visit Sandy's collection on her website.  She even has a flying pig, among other charming creatures.

I'd get a pair in a second, perhaps for my shelf of cookbooks, but I need the space.  There's no room for pigs in . . . oh never mind.

5 comments:

Angie Muresan said...

Pigs are cute in a certain rotund sort of way. I can't imagine them being very cuddly. Those bookends are adorable.

Unknown said...

Awww they are cute :)

Belle de Ville said...

You loved pigs, I loved Swiss cows roaming around in their grassy Alpine meadows....and then I loved dobermans.
Go figure.

Jessica Thor-Miller said...

I had a thing for frogs and toads as a child. I would spend hours catching them, not quite the feminine occupation my mother pined for after raising 3 boys.

As there are no frog bookends, my vote would be for the elephants. I would use them alongside volumes of Babar.

Sister Wolf said...

My son loves pigs. So I love them too, on his behalf. Every so often, though, he complains bitterly about not being allowed to have one for a pet.