Breaking News

Lifestyle Columns

Art deco designs still have plenty of appeal

The first Sunday in November is the time to turn your clocks back an hour. This year, you might want to look back a century, too. The International Exhibition of Modern Decorative and Industrial Arts in Paris ended in November 1925, making art deco, the style it exhibited (not to mention named), officially antique at 100 years old. Its appeal is still going strong; dealers, decorators, and trend watchers have noticed a surge of interest in art deco in recent years. The hundredth anniversary of the exhibition may be a factor, or maybe it’s just that the sleek lines and geometric ...

Recent reads

Here are few of my favorite recent reads. Library staff would be happy to help you place requests on these or any other titles. If you’d like to place your own request, visit www.newulmlibrary.org and choose Library Catalog. All the Belles are called back to Bellerton Academy following its 150th anniversary. A discovery was made on the finishing school grounds during the celebration. As each woman returns, they will have to reckon with their shared past and the once-tight ties of sisterhood. The Belles is an atmospheric, eerie suspense novel with a strong sense of place and time. ...

Skull steins are a creepy way to toast the season

What could be creepier than drinking out of a skull? Porcelain manufacturers in Germany have been making skull-shaped steins for hundreds of years. The one pictured here, which sold for $343 at Fox Auctions, was created by Ernst Bohne Sohne. This company started as a decorating studio in 1848 and was taken over by Gebruder Heubach, famous for their porcelain dolls, about 1919. (Although skull steins were among their most popular designs, no, “Bohne” is not German for “bone.”) As popular as skull steins were, they were traditionally meant for a different occasion than Halloween ...

Halloween reads from the children’s room

It’s less than a week away from Halloween. I loved the night as a child. I loved all the preparation that went into finding or making the perfect costume for trick-or-treating each year. As a young mother I think I had even more fun dressing my children for their school parties and a night of scouring the neighborhood Halloween night looking for the house that gave out full size candy bars. I remember reading at least one spooky, or not so spooky, story before bed each night the week before Halloween. Here are some favorite picks for spooky, sometimes kooky, Halloween reads Room on ...

Gaetano Pesce’s Feltri chair combines comfort, style

Postmodern furniture is a parade of quirky styles and colors, unexpected shapes and materials, and innovative construction. Few designers are more quirky, colorful, or creative than Gaetano Pesce. Like many of the great 20th-century designers, Pesce (1939-2024) trained as an architect and designed lamps, jewelry, other home furnishings, furniture, and buildings. He is known for his clever work with resin and extruded plastic, but his creative output has a softer side, too. His most famous furniture design might be the UP-5 chair, also called “La Mamma” for its curvy, feminine ...

Martin Brothers imitations not a cheap knock-off

They say that imitation is the highest form of praise, and it follows that the most desirable antiques are often the most reproduced. Take the famous “Wally Birds” made by Martin Brothers of England in the late 19th to early 20th centuries. These fanciful stoneware bird figures with heavy texture, colorful glazes, and endearingly grotesque faces can sell for $50,000 or more. Unsurprisingly, they have many imitators that sell for lower prices. But less expensive doesn’t always mean inexpensive. This set of two garden statues inspired by Martin Brothers’s birds sold for $1,037 at ...