Throughout the centuries earring design concentrated on fashion, not comfort. From the primitive stick-through-the-ear beginnings to those pinching screw-backs of the 20th century, women were at the mercy of the painful earring clip. In the 1940s, one woman, Judith McCann, set out to cha...
Madge and Mr. Madge recently returned from a trip-of-a-lifetime through mainland China. First stop was Beijing. It was a hot August day and our itinerary took us through the Temple of Heaven park, Tiananmen Square and to the Forbidden City. Despite the heat most...
Tucked away in a quiet residential neighborhood of Salt Lake City, Utah is the mysterious Gilgal Garden. But is not a regular garden. It's a garden of stone. It’s easy to miss; in fact, Madge did miss it on the first pass since it’s a very narrow sliver of land next to a house. Only a simple blac...
Yesterday in this space, Madge lamented the demise of the late, great department store and also took a tour of the wonderful online site Department Store Museum. While we will never return to those golden days of retail, Madge recently visited something completely new in retail an...
Opening an online shop to sell my vintage collection was a conscious act to de-clutter. Naming the shop Madge’s Hatbox, after my grandmother, was a loving nod to her years as a milliner. Then a chance remark by my aunt sent me on a journey in search of a hat shop my grandmother o...
In mid-century America, a new type of jewelry came into vogue made out of one of man's oldest materials: Copper. Lending itself beautifully to sculptural forms, copper jewelry looks fabulous in deco, mid-century, modernist, and Native American designs. While you can find vintage copper pieces by m...
