Let’s welcome, Liz from Mayflower Vintage to Salem and the HausWitch community! She’ll be holding vintage pop-ups every second Saturday of the month, so come scoop up some beautiful clothing and jewelry from every decade (except the 2000s, let’s be real—that was a dark time).
Hey Liz, start us off. How do you feel about the move from Providence to Salem?
I’m excited to find myself in Salem now. There’s a really great vintage community in Providence and a lot of people that sell down there, and I made some really great friends. But it seems like there is a lot of opportunities to run with this thing up in Salem. To be in a place with such history and a community where so many people care about history and preserving and collecting it—I think it’s a really exciting place for Mayflower to be right now.
Also to be in a community of badass ladies. I’m pretty excited to be at HausWitch!
We’re psyched to have you! Why don’t you tell us a little bit about Mayflower and how it started.
We started almost two years ago, in the summer of 2015. Mayflower is a family affair—I co-own Mayflower with my mother Rebecca. And we have two generations of antique collectors in the family. Her parents were antique dealers and her father was more into toys, postcards, and that kind of memorabilia. Then my grandmother sold vintage costume jewelry. Which, as a kid I was obsessed with because we would get all the odds and ends that she couldn’t sell, like mismatched clip on earrings.
Growing up we always had a lot of vintage items in the house and two years ago my mom and I were walking through the Providence Flea, and we were talking about how we go to estate sales all the time and how we have too much stuff and we thought, ‘you know, we could do this.’ We could get a booth, and buy tent and setup. I think we could do this. We had talked about it for a while, and so we did. And we didn’t know what the hell we were doing the first time we went out.
What is your focus in the antique world?
I collected vintage clothing and that’s how I got into it. My mom sells antiques, vintage home goods, furniture, and decor. And then my dad started selling enough vinyl for us to merit a whole new booth later on. But when I started selling the vintage clothes with my mom's antiques and it went really well the first time...we just…kind of kept doing it.
We just didn’t stop. We kept doing the flea, which we love, because it’s a really good community down in Providence. That’s where I was living at the time. And then we started doing the Urban Vintage Bazaar that happens twice a year in Providence which it great for vintage clothing. We had a little stint at the Rhode Island Antique Mall.
Since I moved up here, we’re trying to think of different ways to expand into Boston, into the North Shore, but we’re still maintaining the stuff we do down in Providence.
AND you’re going to be here the second Saturday of every month!
Yeah! I’m going to be here March 11th and the second Saturday of every month with the exception of May because we just confirmed we’re doing Brimfield for the first time. Which is exciting on many levels. My grandparents used to do Brimfield every summer, so it also feels like we’re continuing that line of the family business.
Oh my gosh, I love that!
Yeah, so we’ll be at the May Brimfield Fair Thursday through Sunday (May 12-14), so we’ll probably be at HausWitch the weekend before or after. It’s a big deal for us, it’s the biggest show you could do around here. I want to say one of the biggest in the country. They do it in May, July, and September, for almost a whole week. It’s just acres and acres of vintage items and antiques.
What is your favorite find? What are the things that make you go, “Ooh, wow, I want someone to buy this, but I also want to keep it for myself, forever.”
Well, that’s the fun of doing this. You know, when I was just buying vintage clothes for myself, it’s so rare that I would find something that fits me. So finding fifties dresses with the tiny waists that are just gorgeous but would never fit me in a million years. Those I get really excited about, especially when someone tries them on at a show and it fits perfectly. Definitely excited.
But then there’s also random things that I never would have thought I would care about, like last weekend was a pair of white leather go-go boots that were awesome. They’re totally not me, but I can appreciate them.
Is there a decade you like more than the others?
We find things from the 30s, all the way to 90s stuff with that nineties revival that’s happening right now. I love something from all of the decades that we get in. It’s just kind of magical finding something no one else has.
When we go to estate sales, it’s almost like, American Pickers style. We’re up at four in the morning driving an hour somewhere. This was deep somewhere in Connecticut, and I saw on the listing that there was a vintage Burberry coat. I was just like, ‘I want this thing.’ Not necessarily for me. It was just this beautiful, blue and green hound’s-tooth, tweed Burberry coat from the sixties—and it was just gorgeous. I realized I needed to be the first one in line because there’s going to be ten other people trying to get that.
I ran up the stairs and it was hanging on the back of a door and I snagged it. It’s those moments: It’s the rush of running in and then being the first one to find something that’s perfect for your shop. And like I said, even though I didn’t necessarily want the coat for myself, it’s just the thrill of the hunt.
What are going to want to be first in line for at the pop-up March 11th?
All this warm weather has me wanting to pull out all the 90s baby doll dresses and florals, but I still have some really great 60s coats that I’ll be marking down since it’s starting to get warmer. And I have a lot of good 70s dresses in right now, 50s party dresses, a lot of great purses from all different years, and jewelry. The gold sequined maxi dress is coming back from our first popup and I’m really hoping that someone is going to snag that.*
Thanks so much for all of your vintage advice, Liz! Get your vintage fix now at the Mayflower Vintage website, or poke through the collection on this Saturday, March 11th at HausWitch. See you all soon!
*Not pictured because it’s on the HWIC and she would murder me for posting it. :)
