Portrait by Venture Photography, Greenwich, CT
Spring cleaning time may be upon us, but it’s more fun to be creative than go to the dump. There’s something terribly satisfying about finding new uses for old stuff. Perhaps because of her apartment upbringing with limited storage space, my mother was a thrower-outer and giver-awayer. If you admired her earrings, she’d take them off and hand them to you.
Anyway, I’ve always been into what we now call repurposing.
Back in 1959, I was stumped about what to do with one wedding present—a giant wooden bowl with compartments too big for peanuts or olives; so I returned it to Bonwit Teller and traded it in for a polo coat. When the mink stole I’d bought with my first year’s earnings as a copywriter with Howard Senor Advertising became hopelessly out of style, I asked David at Greenwich Furs to line the hood of a parka with it. (Love mink around my ears!) I took a collection of Copenhagen “year” plates my mother kept giving me down to Estate Treasures and made enough money to buy Jack a camera for Christmas.
What about the little silver ashtrays from our bridesmaids? I put votive candles on them, set them on six-inch round mirrors made for me at a glass cutter and scattered them around the dining room table, where they sparkled plenty. A wonderland of light.
Remember the old bulbous computer monitors? A friend of mine took out the guts, spread a towel on the bottom and turned it into a bed for her cat Wilson. He just loved it!
The big brass 19th-c. basin with the imperial crest? The Russians made jam in it, but I use it for handing out juice boxes to thirsty Halloween goblins.
The heavy-duty encyclopedia? It’s great for pressing ferns.
The boxes of seashells from Jamaica? I was going to make a mirror, except when Sandy Herman first invited Jack and me to her lovely pad on John’s Island, she announced: “No hostess presents, and for God’s sake, no shell mirrors!” She could always read my mind.
The stuffed Ptarmigan in all its white plumage from the airport shop in Iceland? Make a lamp out of it, but keep an eye on your Golden Retriever.
Grandfather’s gold filigree cufflinks centered with little diamonds? Have your favorite jeweler convert them into a handsome scarf pin.
The big cut-crystal bowl with a silver rim? You could use it for a Fish House punch party, if you dared. Jack had a 200-year-old recipe from the old Fish House Lodge on the Schuylkill and was whipping up a batch for a gathering in his bachelor pad when we first met. The stuff is so lethal that one departing guest fell down the front steps and didn’t know he’d broken his leg until he woke up the next morning.
Oh, I almost forgot: If you’re ever in Chinatown, pick up some Chinese newspapers. They make handsome wrapping paper tied with a red ribbon.
But some things are more challenging to repurpose.
The trunkfuls of curtains and bedspreads in the attic? Take up quilting.
Great-aunt Miriam’s shoes in the attic? Tie them to the bumper of the getaway car at the next wedding.
The silent butler? Good for crumbing the table. Better yet, get a butler.
The defunct buzzer, vintage 1942, over the headboard of my bed? Get it activated, hire a maid … and dream on.
Of course, using some of these things for landfill is always an option, but that’s unsportsmanlike. Just don’t ask your kids what they’d do with the stuff. You don’t want to know.