Ah the Wonders of an Estate House!

On Sunday the Long Beach Historical Society held its annual homes tour.

The tour provided access to a number of private residences for a mere $30.  The variety was astounding, a few homes representing the later periods in Long Beach architectural history but the majority were true estate homes from the early 1900's, complete with servants' entrances, staircases, and quarters, and owners who took up the cause of a true to history renovation. Makes me want to drop everything and dedicate my life to an estate house restoration. (photo source)

Also of interest was the variety of people on this tour.  Some were locals who came what I can only guess is the same attitude that compels people to attend neighbors' open houses -- sheer curiosity -- while others were local history or architecture buffs and a few were owners of estate homes themselves, looking for ideas and camaraderie.  A bus full of ladies in red hats stood out and my own research confirms that this is a national organization.  Strange.   

But oh my, what beautiful homes... and seems like there are still quite a few around in need of significant TLC.  Perhaps Long Beach is the answer to the question, "what happens when all the Brownstones in Brooklyn have been renovated and resold?"  If it wouldn't consume all my time, money, and perhaps my soul, I would start saving now for one of these beauties.  If anyone out there knows, please share your thoughts on who catches this bug and why?

Selling Out for the Environment???

On Thursday, I participated in a fashion show at the Allegria Hotel. For those of you who are not familiar, the Allegria is a luxury hotel that recently opened in Long Beach, New York. The show was part of a Go Green Festival that included other events too, like a sand scultpure competition (and since we're talking about selling out, please see shameless plug below for a local RE agent -- you can see the one sand sculpture w/sponsors' names in the background, unfortunately none of the pretty environmental themed ones :( .)

The woman who altered my wedding dress (Stephanie from Frock, a local dress shop) asked me to model my wedding dress as an example of how a restored and updated wedding dress can be modern and fashionable but also environmentally friendly.

Being asked to participate presented something of a moral dilemma for me because while I love the concept of the show, my dress has huge sentimental value to me as it was my late mother's and I wore it while marrying my awesome husband, and I also want to support Stephanie in any way possible, the sponsors of the overall festival are owners of a local business I have had a dispute with. In particular, they used my wedding dress as a guinea pig to build their wedding dress business then shredded it and refused to share in the additional alteration costs it took to get the dress into usable condition, which were significant. (Among other things I was forced into certain decisions about the placement of the waist and hemlines, and I can only imagine what their attitude would have been if I had not found a miracle worker to salvage the dress... but I digress.)

In the end I decided to do it, and had to suffer the indignity of seeing a reference in some of the promotional materials to the effect of their business being the "safest" place to dry clean/restore a vintage item of clothing. I have a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. Did I sell out???