No mice here at the Casa du Borghese...they're all in town at the Dame'S flower shop Paper Moon. Yes, the windows have been unveiled for this season, and were even featured already in the Harrisburg Magazine! YAY!!! This year the windows were mice themed, with mechanical mice. The first window features the mice having fun with shaking packages to see what's in them. Possibly cheese? The second window finds a trio of mice in Santa's room helping him prepare his suit before the big night. The windows are always so fun and get very good feedback from the clientele and passer bys, as many miss seeing these vintage Christmas windows, if stores even still do them, or the windows are very brand heavy and aren't at all creative. The last three windows have featured mechanical figurines that have been reproduced from original figurines from the legendary Christmas Co, David Hamberger Inc, who from the early 1920s created mechanical figurines for many legendary department stores globally and for mall set ups for Christmas. The company folded in or around 2008, but this artist we know in Brooklyn does extremely detailed reproductions of many of the line of characters and even make the little clothes they wear. One can barely tell they are not originals. The windows one year started with the famous Hamberger elves, then last year to penguins, which were a huge hit, to this years mice. Another hit. And the Dame tells me, the shop has been just as busy. Which reminds me SHOP SMALL AND SHOP LOCAL kids!!!! Or support your favorite charities and passions. I did and all my shopping is done.
What craftsmanship - on the mice and the entire display. Bravo! The shopping is done and have redirected charitable contributions to a GoFundMe page for a friend from my theatre days who is in dire straits fighting cancer for a 2nd time.
ReplyDeleteHow awful Pat! I hope he beats it a third time!!!
DeleteThank you. Me, too. because he's one of the nicest, kindest, most generous people I know.
DeleteLove, love, LOVE!
ReplyDeleteThe creativity, the imagination, the wit! Fantastic windows. The mice helping Santa? Too cute!
Absolutely beautiful! Holiday window shopping is always so much fun!
XOXO
I'll be heading to New York for a quick jaunt this weekend to visit my Brooklyn boys. Window shopping is on my list.
Deletewhat joyful views!
ReplyDeleteVery Nice!
ReplyDeleteI don't have enough adjectives. Beautiful, clever, charming, elegant, classy, uplifting... If I passed a shop like that, I'd go inside and spend every time.
ReplyDeleteYou'd probably love his Mitchell.
DeleteI'm not sure that Wolfgang would be impressed by those mice. But then he isn't into Christmas either; cats tend not to be. My winter fuel allowance (for being an aged person) got given to a charity for the homeless after the unlovely Cruella (former home secretary) informed us that homelessness was a lifestyle choice and that the police should take tents away from any homeless person lucky enough to have one. Every day, in every way, the UK government gets worse and worse (or should I say eviller and eviller?).
ReplyDeleteWhat a shame Helen. Here in the downtown hamlet, it's much the same. The city, like other US cities,keeps making these "tents cities" disband and move...but to where??? We need to start using vacated buildings and strip plazas to house the less fortunate.
DeleteThat is adorable! I challenge anyone walking by the shop not to smile. I bet they can't do it.
ReplyDeleteEspecially the kids!!!! I wonder if and when future kids won't have the joy to see stuff like this.
DeleteWonderful!
ReplyDeleteOh how absolutely wonderful! You clever little sausage! Xx
ReplyDeleteI only wish the mice in my house were that cute and innocent.
ReplyDeleteI'll send you some down Jon.
DeleteThose are amazing looking windows how fun. Probably the only place downtown Harrisburg that does Windows anymore. I have got to come in there and support that shop and say hi.
ReplyDeleteI think your right. Outside of NYC and Philly, I have not seen any Christmas windows anywhere I've been.
DeleteI love those meeces to pieces!
ReplyDeleteThese windows are so lovely, and the smiling mice so cute you want to hug them. I so agree that such windows are so much more attractive than those filled with branded products, for as mercantile the Season can be our minds deserve the magic of the tales we were read as kids.
ReplyDeleteNow in my late 50s I am old enough to remember how animated windows were an enchantement at this time of year, for both youngsters and adults alike. Still today such windows would make me enter the shop, no matter what it is selling, only in the hope of immersing myself deeper in the Holidays’ spirit. Please pass on my appreciation to The Dame for the true effort and will at keeping this tradition alive.
Yet again I hug you for sharing a piece of dream.
Laurent
Will do Laurent!!!! I agree with much you say. These magical windows remind me so much of the Christmases of yester year, when downtowns shop had stunning windows and town streets and squares were bejeweled with garlands and lamp post decorations...and shop windows are sadly another dying art form. The windows for next Christmas are already planned!!!!
DeleteSweet! Jx
ReplyDeleteLove the mice ... they look like Cinderella's mice. moonlighting with Santa!
ReplyDeleteCinderelly, Cinderelly
DeleteNight and day it's Cinderelly
Make the fire, fix the breakfast
Wash the dishes, do the mopping
The mice are adorable! I remember the windows of Macy's when I was a child. I have absolutely no place to visit now to see pretty shop windows.
ReplyDeleteLove,
Janie
You should do NYC some time at Christmas. Truly awe inspiring and magical. Nice to see just once even.
DeleteSooo cute. Love the little mouse ironing. The whole scene is just magical.
ReplyDeleteThat's the one thing I'll miss about moving here...seeing the beautiful windows of the shops in New York and Philly. It does a old lady's heart good to know that people like you and the Dame keep the art form alive. The windows are charming and magical. The Dame should be proud.
ReplyDeleteThe post made me happy. The Santa suit with the mice helping prepare it is so fun! I remember those figurines from windows when I was young, but never did know who the maker of them. I read a nice piece once on David Hamberger and his art.
ReplyDeleteI beg to differ...even Philly doesn't have windows that cute!!!!! terrible store don't keep this art up. Don't they know windows draw them in? Look how many along said they enter just from these windows.
ReplyDeleteYou creative types amaze me. What fun pictures and windows.
ReplyDeleteAdorable windows!!! And I can only imagine the inside of the shop from just the brief shot showing the inside.
ReplyDeleteTundra Bunny here...
ReplyDeleteThe Dame has produced another fabulous and absolutely magical Xmas window display! Being a florist shop, I bet it smells wonderful inside too. I've always loved looking into small shop windows to see if their displays would entice me in to look around -- I miss that in the modern big box store/on-line landscape.
Every year...I get more and more turned off by big box stores. There getting so impersonal, and heavens forbid you ask for something or where it is at. They look at you like one has three heads, or your interrupting them. I go out of my way to shop small anymore.
Delete