IN ANOTHER ERA THIS IS WHERE MY BELOVED WOULD HAVE STOPPED FOR FLOWERS

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34 Comments

  1. April 25, 2013

    Dearest V
    For some reason this makes me thing of a television programme (before my time) that survives in the cultural memory of the United Kingdom… ‘Bill and Ben The Flowerpot Men’… I fancy this store would have taken their fancy as an abode.
    Now, I’m off to photograph uncut flowers and make metaphorical hay while the sun continues to shine.
    Yours ever
    The Perfumed Dandy

    • April 25, 2013

      I hope to see the blossoms later. This is another example of a type of architecture (whimsical, fanciful?) that dotted LA in the 20s – flower pots, coffee pots, old boots, spotted dogs, donuts, airplanes, windmills, – ker-razy – but preferable to mini-malls.

  2. George Kaplan
    April 25, 2013

    Oh-ho! Would you look at *that*! At least you couldn’t miss its purpose. I wonder how long ago that was? I can imagine purchasing flowers from there. Fun!
    (“Feed Me Seymour!”, wait, now it seems scary 😉 )

    • April 25, 2013

      Eighty/ninety years ago — around the time my house was built…

  3. George Kaplan
    April 25, 2013

    Perfumed Dandy – “Bill and Ben”! Yes, that was my first thought too! (where is – and sorry for the incomprehensibility my american friends! – is little wee-eed?! In the pot? Jeepers! O, and this isn’t a drug reference, it’s weirder than that 🙂 )

    • April 26, 2013

      All I could see was Bill and Ben too! The wee-eyed would be terrifyingly large if that pot was hiding a flowerpot man. Thanks to YouTube for reminding me how terrible kids tv used to be.

      • April 26, 2013

        I have to watch Bill and Ben and see what you all are reminiscing about!

  4. April 25, 2013

    The Flower Pot Men were a sixties band who did a song called Lets go to San Francisco.I just Youtubed them.They have a very American close harmony sound although they were British.Now just where did I put my Give Peace a Chance badge? Right now I am ready- I look so good in flared crushed velver pants,teamed with a Grandad vest,a smelly goatskin Afgan coat that has that has not been cleaned properly and sandels.My time travelling VW van stands ready and just as soon as I find the patchouli oil I will be away.

  5. April 26, 2013

    Vickie,me joking never.I am the pensive looking one second from left in band line up.I dress like that every day as a sixties style hippie dandy.Well I would if I did not look like a short version of a WWF wrestler{ minus the tattoos}.

    • April 26, 2013

      Everybody looks short off camera…

      • April 26, 2013

        Yes Betel nut would have done it.I am sure you will really enjoy looking up the Count.A very,very strange man,albeit it great to read about and I hope you enjoy doing so.

      • April 26, 2013

        I’ve got a little list 😉

  6. April 26, 2013

    Vickie,another another sixties Dandy that may amuse.I know I like him-is Jason King.He can be Youtubed-Department S.It was a camp and fun sixties Spy TV series.It later span off into Jason King another TV series.

    On a more serious note I did think of writing something for The Perfumed Dandy re the famous Dandy and Aristocrat Count Robert de Montesquiou{being the informed person he is,he probably knows of him already} who was a poet and promoter of many visual artists of the fin-de-sicle period such as Emille Galle.

    He knew the actress Sarah Bernhardt,admired by Oscar Wilde as his Salome.Talented Sarah was well known for having a taste for sleeping in coffins.Yes well I did say it was the fin-de sicle.

    The Count had quite a lot of portraits of himself painted by various artists,possibly the most published being the one by Giovanto Boldini painted in 1897 showing the Count striking a dramatic pose with a silver topped cane.Like Jason King he has elaborate facial fungus.

    The Count has elsewhere been descibed as hiding his small black teeth{black teeth- help} behind an elegantly gloved hand.

    Enough, I will leave The Scarlet Pimpernel for another day and another mental wander.

    • April 26, 2013

      More for me to read about, eccentric and fascinating subjects are my cup of tea! Thank you!

  7. April 26, 2013

    Vicke,Slightly Goth reflection,maybe the Count did not have disturbing dental hygeine,maybe he painted those teeth,he was a pretty strange person to put it mildly.Lets hope so.

    • April 26, 2013

      Maybe with Betel Nut – that would be preferable to tooth decay.

  8. April 26, 2013

    Of The Pimpernel, its quite strange the number of actors who have portrayed this very dashing British hero who have not been British themselves,Marius Goring springs to mind.

    • April 26, 2013

      He wasn’t British??? I always thought he was…

  9. April 26, 2013

    Now this is utterly fantastic. LOOK at that thing! I would be a regular for sure.

    • April 26, 2013

      I especially like how the flowers were displayed in baskets. Nobody does that anymore!

      • April 26, 2013

        Vickie,I am reliant on memory here,but I think that he was German,just like The Royal Family ha ha.

      • April 26, 2013

        Oh – that kind of German, humph!

      • April 26, 2013

        Yes the Von Humph family to be precise.

      • April 26, 2013

        What was the Windsor family name before they changed it?

      • April 26, 2013

        Department S can be Youtubed by the way Vickie.I used to love it,but not quite so much as that other marvelously camp show The Avengers.I am hopng that one of my children will do the kind thing and buy me a boxed set.

      • April 26, 2013

        It’s the X Files with a stiff upper lip and bad lighting! I’ll keep an eye out for the Avengers, which, if recall – was rather stylish…

      • April 26, 2013

        Yes it was stylish indeed with the very dapper John Steed complete with brolly and bowler hat.Thats how a True Englishman should dress when in town and tweeds for the country.I say that with my tongue firmly in my cheek.In point of fact I have not seen a bowler hat in years.

      • April 26, 2013

        I think I’m remembering those mod black outfits of Emma Peel – and how I would marvel at her hair always being so neat. I must have seen it in reruns during the seventies, come to think of it.

  10. April 27, 2013

    Ah yes the Divine Miss Peel,beatiful ,but deadly.

  11. April 27, 2013

    So stunned was I by the memory of said Miss Peel, that I even forgot how to spell beautiful -oh me oh my.

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