Don’t miss our Pop-Up Weekend September 24-25

Dear Clients and Friends, Poster Collectors, Ephemera Fans,

I hope you are enjoying this incredible Indian Summer. As Northern Californians, of course you know that fall is right on its tail.  In just a few short days, the sun will set earlier, the leaves will start to turn on your apple trees, and all of a sudden, your thoughts will turn from spending time outdoors to spending time in your home.

It’s time to feather your nest.  Add things to your walls that make it a nicer place to come home to, a nicer place to entertain in. Just in time, we announce our September Pop- Up Weekend.

Please join us this weekend September 24-25 at our Berkeley showroom for what we are calling “French Treat” a special feature of Food and Wine Posters.  Our entire collection will also be available for your perusal, and we are always prepared to help you design the perfect frame for your purchase.

The shop is open only one weekend per month, so now is your chance to come and choose the perfect thing to spruce up your nest for the holidays and the winter months.  Frames designed this weekend will be completed by November 1, well in time for the winter holidays.

You can shop our collection any time at www.vepca.com, but seeing the posters in person is the best way to fall in love with your next piece of original artwork.  I hope you’ll join us for a toast this weekend! Sponsored by wine.com

With Every Good Wish,

Elizabeth, Charly, Karlie and Candie
The VEP Crew

THE DETAILS
September Pop-Up Weekend
Saturday September 24 from 11-6
Sunday, September 25 from 11-5

VEP ‘Outpost’
2201 Fourth Street (corner of Allston)
Berkeley, CA  94710
510.843.2201
www.vepca.com

Also open by appointment

Vintage Posters LOVES a good party.

Cotes du Rhone tasting at Vintage European Posters Showroom

The Finer Things

My roots in the Bay Area go way back.  In the decade before I sold my first poster, I made a living in the exhilarating world of Events planning.  This was an incredible career for a curious young person. I had a chance to see the interiors of most beautiful homes of Piedmont, Orinda and Lafayette, providing private parties and with corporate work spent my weekends working parties for Apple Computer, Napa Valley Wine Auction and many others. These events exposed me to many of the best hotels, ballrooms and event centers all over the Bay Area. I never got tired of seeing all of these secret venues, and seeing them transformed for events was even better.

More than 15 years ago I had a chance to work with the renowned Grace Street Catering, and I never forgot their style. I have stayed in touch with the dream team behind Grace, Erin McKinney and Anastasia Alvarado.  Turns out, Erin and Anastasia have a love of vintage posters,  so we have had plenty to talk about over the years.

Grace Street counts the Asian Art Museum, The DeYoung and the Legion Of Honor among their clients.  The provision of fine food, and great service for people enjoying art is Grace Streets’s manifesto, so working with VEP to create a stellar event for our 13^th Annual Preview Show was a natural.

We started out by checking out Grace Street’s amazing showroom at 4629 Martin Luther King Way in Oakland.

Vepca installation at Grace Street Catering showroom in Oakland.

The Grace Street showroom is available for private party rental.  They have hosted Audi’s debut of the new A7,  and  the Northern California Cheese Society, but local foodies will know the address as the Pop Up General Store held where delicious premade treats are available for purchase from local food celebs such as Chris Lee from Eccolo and Rachel Saunders of Blue Chair Jam.

Their space has beautiful walls, great light and a real industrial chic I find appealing. To me, those big walls were crying out for posters, so in June, we packed up our van, hired crackerjack art installer David Beckett and went back to the Grace Street Studio to do some aerial tricks.

Cachou Lajaunie by Cappiello

You can pop in on weekdays to see the framed posters on display, as well as to look at Grace Street’s portfolio of events.

Erin and I got to talking about France. Eating well all over France is one of the perks of the poster business.  We have long enjoyed reminiscing about food with our clients, sharing our stories of favorite memories and trading addresses of must see places. I told Erin about eating Bouillabaise in Marseille. I saw him thinking about that. And then we talked about little fishies, a “french  treat” of fried anchovies with Romesco sauce, and then the flavors of the summer I have enjoyed so much in the South of France – olives, peppers, tomatoes, figs, eggplant.

Freshly Shucked Miyagi Oyster Courtesy of Grace Street

The menu that Grace Street prepared for our guests at the 13^th annual Preview Show last month evoked all of those South of France memories, and created something I think everyone will remember for years to come.  Miyagi oysters from Tomales Bay, with a natural clear cucumber flavor floated in their crystal clear brine, and were served with mignonette sauce.

Grace Street's own rabbit pate

Rabbit Pate with tiny toasts was earthy and peppery, Liver mousse was refreshingly earthy — for once not overly sweetened for the American palette.

The very best way to serve small fish!

Boquerones wrapped in faux bois paper cones and served with

Romesco Sauce had the perfect crunch.

Salted caramels

To end the night, Grace Street served Salted Caramels with a rosy

pink salt.  We all left the party smiling, cast in a rosy glow . Bravo!

Don’t miss our 13th Annual Preview Show Aug. 19-21

Dear Clients and Friends,

The Posters Have Arrived!

It is with great pleasure that I invite you to our 13 ^th Annual Preview Show August 19-21 at our showroom in Berkeley. Please, save the date! This is the show we have all come to look forward to: it is your chance to see the new acquisitions from my summer buying trip.  This year I have found some incredible things!  All told, I added 101 posters to our collection, and I hope you will come enjoy the first chance to see these treats.

A Paper Hoard!

Original vintage posters are hard to find. Paper was thrown away, paper disintegrates, paper is fragile, it’s transient, it’s ephemeral. Luckily, there have always been some collectors, and there have always been some hoarders, and so some paper did survive, intentionally and by
chance.

I have been searching for these collections, these piles, these stashes and hoards for many years now.  Once I find a stash, I try to visit a few times and then step back, to wait for more good things to sift their way up the pile. The nature of a paper hoarder tends towards the disorganized and it is rarely possible to see everything in one week.  On this buying trip, I revisited some places I haven’t been in years and I was richly
rewarded.

We have treats this year beyond posters. I am also pleased to announce our partnership with Grace Street Catering, and with our neighbor Wine.com. I think you will be delighted with their offerings.  The menu and the wine have been curated to evoke the South of France.

We have changed the venue! Many of you are accustomed to attending our preview show at Fort Mason.  This year, we have moved the event to our showroom in Berkeley and it will be better than ever.

Please mark your calendar! I look forward to showing you all of the new treats in our
beautiful Berkeley showroom.

Friday hours 11-7
Saturday 10-7
Sunday 12-5

With Every Good Wish,

Elizabeth “I sift through paper so you don’t have to” Norris

www.vepca.com
2201 Fourth Street
Berkeley,
CA  94710
510.843.2201

 

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Vintage Poster Showroom July 23, 24 Pop-Up Weekend

Dear Client and Friends,

Need a break from the sun?

Come on in to our Berkeley Showroom for a peek at what is new in Vintage Posters this upcoming weekend July 23-24! We have Herman Miller posters, 36 newly acquired David Lance Goines Posters from 1974-1987, Also 73 newly acquired Maitre De L’Affiche posters from 1896-1900. 

Original "Herman Miller Office Systems" Poster by Philip Mitchell

 

Original "Starlight Savon" Poster, Maitres de l'Affiche Plate #196. By Henri Meunier, 1899

 

Original "Chez Panisse EAT" Poster by David Lance-Goines, 1980

Elizabeth has been buying every poster she can get her hands on, and believe me that is a lot of posters!

In fact, our summer interns Karlie and Candie from UC Berkeley’s Histor and Comp Lit programs break a sweat every Tuesday trying to keep up with cataloguing of all the goodies that E brings us every week.

Original "Berkeley Public Library" Poster by David Lance-Goines, 1974

Sales are really healthy.

We have sold through a lot of the Stan Galli collection we were so excited about last year (much to our dismay ALL of the Los Angeles and Hawaii posters are now gone)and have also been selling a fair number of good art deco posters and some Cherets as well.

Original "United Airlines Southern California" Poster by Stan Galli, c. 1955

Original "United Airlines San Francisco Cable Car" Poster by Stan Galli, c.1955

 

Don’t miss all the goodies!

Measure your walls and come to Berkeley this weekend to delve into the history of graphic design! If you measure your walls, you just might leave with something beautiful as well.

Posterfully yours,

Charly Leys

Showroom Manager

DETAILS

Vintage European Posters July Pop-Up Weekend

July 23-24

Saturday 11-6, Sunday 11-5

2201 Fourth Street (corner of Allston Way)

Berkeley, CA 94710

510 843 2201

 

PS- Our neighborhood is a foodie paradise. Plan your meal to
go with vintage posters!

 

Come for breakfast! Bette’s Ocean View Diner

Break for lunch O Chame and Zut

Stay for Oysters Café Rouge and Spengers

A Little Retail Inspiration

Modern Poster, Modern Framing, Modern Design at Undrest on Abbott Kinney

We love our little shop on Fourth Street in Berkeley. After 14 years of doing shows, we are finally anchored there. I find a lot of inspiration while traveling, something about leaving behind the quotidian, so it makes sense that I am interested in shops now that we have one.

I arrived in LA a day earlier than usual for the Dwell on Design Show and headed right for Abbott Kinney Blvd. Now in recent years I have developed a fascination with Los Angeles, especially Santa Monica. I have decided that LA is analogous to New York City — it’s big, it’s hungry for design, and it is packed with excellence. Our own fair city, San Francisco, is analogous to Boston. It’s small, it’s provincial, it’s slow to warm to trends, and it’s intellectual. Vis a vis neighborhoods, Santa Monica’s Abbott Kinney Blvd. is a lot like Fourth Street Berkeley. It is packed with small boutiques full of one of a kind treasures, and hivey small businesses doing interesting things behind closed doors.

Intelligentsia Cafe on Abbott Kinney

So, I struck out on a mission to explore Abbott Kinney. I started with coffee at Intelligentsia with a friend from Berkeley High School days. Great conversation because we were, essentially, kids together. Right next door to Intelligentsia is Neptina, my friend Lianne‘s store, which is, like Vintage European Posters, open by appointment only. Lianne collects, sells, and manufactures incredible glass objects, including vases, lighting, tables, and more. Her shop has been on Abbott Kinney for 14 years: you might say she was Abbott Kinney before Abbott Kinney was Abbott Kinney.

Leanne's shop, where she keeps the good glass

Next, I wanted to visit Undrest, which is the glamorous swimwear shop founded by our glamorous client Maria. I was tickled to see our framed posters there on  display — they have “Relax” by Rene Gruau, “Piscina Sarteano” by Anthoy, and Villemot’s beautiful “Cote d’Azur” poster from 1965. The “Cote d’Azur” hangs on a beautiful blue wall — a welcoming presence to guests as they enter the shop.

Original "Cote d'Azur" Poster by Villemot in the entry of Undrest

Original "Piscina di Sarteano" Poster by Athoy, 1962

After Undrest, I went straight to A+R, a shop that features ‘Global Design. Edited.’ at 1121 Abbott Kinney Blvd, right across the street. A+R was the featured store at Dwell on Design and their shop is a design buff’s dream. They of course, feature the wooly pockets(picture) which I covet, along with the Pantone color chairs that I love. This shop is the epitome of the Dwell mindset and the Dwell aesthetic. Love it!

Pantone chairs by A+R

Wooly pockets in use by A+R

At the end of the day, Charly and Candie arrived from their long dusty drive down the 5 and we relaxed and ate an amazing dinner at 3 Square – where else, but on Abbott Kinney.

The three of us at 3 Squares