Shopping around

This is apparently long ago news. So long ago, in fact, that when the story came out, I was just a broth of a girl. A sweet young thing of sixty. So long ago, that Twitter was just really finding its audience (i.e., everyone) and finally taking off. So long ago, that Donald Trump wasn't yet a raging fascistic power monger hell bent on destroying our democracy. Back then, he was nothing more than an annoying huckster, a wanker with a fake reality show ("The Apprentice") who was able to satisfy his narcissistic supply by insulting, demeaning, and firing people who really didn't work for him. Ah, those were the days. 

Anyway, the long ago non-news from the Year of Our Lord 2010 is that Barbra Streisand has a shopping mall in the basement of the main house on the grounds of her Malibu estate.

The mall isn't exactly a suburban mall anchored by a Macy's and/or a Crate & Barrel. It's a "collection of turn-of-the-last-century-style shops [that] beckons 'customers' to step inside," the shops laid out on a "cobblestone-paved, antique-lantern-lit 'street.'"

There's a Sweet Shop, where guests coming to Chez

Streisand/Brolin for a movie screening can load up (for free) on popcorn and theater snacks. She has a Gift Shoppe - genius! - where she keeps new items like soap dishes and candlesticks that she can use when she needs a hostess gift. The Gift Shoppe even comes with its own wrapping table.

This reminds me of an old friend of my cousin's who, in her retirement, worked part time for years at Williams-Sonoma, where she took advantage of the sales and employee discounts to purchase all sorts of Williams-Sonoma wares like pizzelle makers, panini grills, and soda machines. The sorts of thing that people don't buy for themselves, but are happy enough to receive as gifts. 

I was at this woman's house once and we went down to her basement to check it out. It was not a Streisand-esque old timey-town shopping district. It was just a basement. A basement packed, floor to ceiling, with Williams-Sonoma boxes. This was years ago, and the stockpile might be depleted by now, but when I was there is was loaded to the gills.

My cousin and her daughters-in-law were gifted with many of the stockpiled items over the years.

(Seriously, you may not need a pizzelle maker, but who doesn't want one?)

Streisand's personal shopping mall is, of course, something else entirely. 

Like everything on her estate, the shops grew out of years of careful research. On a trip to the legendary decorative-arts museum Winterthur in Delaware, she was fascinated by a series of early-19th-century shops created by curators to display their collections. "Seeing Winterthur's indoor street, I thought how ingenious that was," she remembers. "Instead of just storing my things in the basement, I can make a street of shops and display them." (Source: Harpers Bazaar) 

Winterthur? I don't think it exists any longer, but I used to love getting the Winterthur catalog. In fact, that's where my Christmas tree topper came from. I also have some lovely, pale pink glass beads my mother got from there. Very pretty. I almost wore them the other day. 

...While most of the stores offer stock that comes and goes, the Antique Clothes Shop is truly a museum. Paneled in lavender-painted boiserie, it displays some of the star's most famous costumes, including her "People"-number gown from the Broadway production of Funny Girl, made of green chiffon over pink silk, with little beaded balls on the sleeves. 

Between the Winterthur lookalikes and the clothing museum, it's official: I wouldn't mind an invite to Streisand's mansion. Sounds like a place that's plenty fun to shop around in.

Not that I'm all that much of a shopper. Oh, I still buy things. But I'm not the shopper I used to be. 

Here I'm probably kidding myself. In the last couple of weeks I got some new napkins and a couple of Martha Stewart lemon-design serving pieces. I pretty much had to, given that I was hosting Easter dinner for the first time and really needed something springy and fresh. And the Martha Steward platter and bowl were marked down from $50 to $17.99, so they were practically free. Still, this and a few other recent purchases aside, these days I'm more into de-accessioning. You get to the point in your life when you really don't need anything.

As for clothing shopping, 99.99% of the time I'm wearing casual - and I do mean casual, not business casual - and if I'm buying something it's mostly (but, admittedly, not always) to replace something that's no longer wearable.

Anyway, there's more to Streisand's estate than the shopping plaza. 

A veritable village, it includes the rustic mill house, which boasts a 14-foot-high, 4,000-pound water wheel; Grandma's house, a cozy cottage filled with quilts; and the main house, a rambling yet elegant white mansion. But the heart of the property is the barn, a giant U-shaped clapboard structure flanked by a stone silo. A two-tiered central great room inside leads to a show-house-like collection of period rooms: the Federal lounge, the Greene & Greene library, the Stickley office, the art-nouveau bathroom, the napping room, and, yes, that street of shops.

A Stickley office? With a Stickley rocking chair that Babs sometimes sits and rocks in? 

Yep, I officially want an invite. 

I won't really be shopping around. Just window shopping. Maybe sit in the Stickley rocker and do a bit of rocking.

Streisand's spread is, of course, a tad bit on the cra side. And the water wheel is definitely goofy. But it all seems harmless enough. She's earned her money, and she grew up pretty poor, so if she wants to indulge in her fancies, oh, why not.  

And that Gift Shoppe. What can I say that I haven't said already. Genius!