Brent had an eventful week in Paris at Maison et Objet checking in with our valued manufacturers and forging new potential relationships.  He was fortunate to have the perfect sidekick, his daughter Daisy (the original eye of the day), to advise him on design and the gastronomic corners of the city.  Together they strolled the Jardin des Tuileries between rows of stately wood citrus planters.  These French planter boxes are seen throughout the country at the entrance of countless sophisticated hotels, shops and restaurants, including the famed Paul Bocuse restaurants in Lyon.  Both Brent and Daisy knew that these iconic planters, also known as Versailles Planters, should be represented at Eye of the Day.  And so begins a new friendship with the owner of a manufacturing company producing traditional French wooden citrus planters.

The charming gentleman, let’s call him Mr. French, arrived at Brent and Daisy’s hotel in his restored 1959 Bentley and they toured the city and spent their final evening at his home.  An agreement was reached and Eye of the Day is proud to carry these fine French planters.  They are available in a number of sizes and are made from acacia wood or teak with customary metal bands.  Both types of wood are naturally oil saturated which aids in avoiding deterioration.   The first wooden citrus planters were invented by Andre Le Notre, the gardener of King Louis XIV for the Palace of Versailles, near Paris.  Using the traditional design, the planter boxes have removable sides in order to access the roots of the plants for pruning.

The French wooden citrus planter is an ideal addition to the impressive assortment of garden containers at Eye of the Day.  Brent, this time with Daisy, continues to prove that he is, indeed,  Entrepreneur & Seeker of Fine Garden and Horticultural Artifacts.

Natural Acacia wood planter box at Eye of the Day shown here also available in Teak.  Galvanized inserts and custom finishes available upon request.

A Buyer’s Experience in Greece, Italy and France

Traveling from Rome to Athens is not at all stressful – fifteen minutes from the hotel to the airport, an easy check-in and a flight just a bit longer than Los Angeles to San Francisco.  The things that Rome and Athens share are lots of cars, noise, pollution and graffiti.  But they also share great food, tons of visual stimulation, and great history lessons with every step you take.

 I just want to walk by the Foro Romano time and time again or around the Plaka and look up at the Acropolis, especially at night.  Both cities look better at night when they light their past and allow the present to be hidden by darkness.  In Rome,  you walk by shop windows with merchandise you would never turn your head for at home, but the Italians really know how to dress a window.  And don’t even get me started on the great artichokes in Rome or the feta and yogurt in Greece.

As the buyer for Eye of the Day – Garden Design Center, taking care of business is quite an adventure. For three days we drove from suburb to suburb outside the center of Athens visiting shops, reclamation yards and places that you couldn’t say were either, looking for old garden accessories and singular items to be made into fountains.  We decided to call off our visit to the gypsy camp in Athens when we learned that it was too dangerous.  I know when to listen to good advice.  We did meet with the gypsy the next morning  in the center of the city and we bought most of his old copper pots for a bargain price.  Prices aren’t as low as I would like, but the Greeks and Italians are having a hard time dealing with their new economic reality.  One sector of business that seems to be booming is the spray paint business.  My sidekick, Joe Kalina has visited Athens dozens of times over the last thirty years and said sadly “It looks like a war zone these days”.

Now it is our job to load the truck onto the ferry for an overnight cruise to Ancona, Italy, from which we will drive to the Rocco factory in Siena and load the fifty exquisite old and antique Pithari that Kostas has found for us over the last two years.  Then we will be back in Rome the next day on our way to Paris for the Maison et Objet to see our French vendors and maybe find something new. The new items we are buying are expected back in United States in time for our 14th Annual “Getting Ready for Spring” sale which features major discounts on nearly every line and runs for almost a whole month from Feb. 13th to March 17th.

Over the last few years we have focused on survival and have been importing only products that have become our staples: Italian terracotta, French Anduze pottery and hand-thrown Greek terracotta pots.   Pre-Recession, Eye of the Day traveled throughout the world and brought back some amazing things for our customers.  These one-of-a-kind items coupled with our large inventory of antique oil jars from Italy, Greece, Spain and France have helped see us through slow times.  We often hear that our customers are amazed with our large inventory and what a pleasure it is to be able to find items for their projects.

Many of our special finds have been sold so now it is time to begin exploring the shops and fairs throughout Europe looking for old jars, pieces of stone, architectural iron and funk that just seems to work in a garden.  I look forward to keeping you updated with my wanderings and great finds over the next few weeks, and hope that you may find something to tickle your fancy that you just can’t live without.

Many who know about my wanderings comment that I am lucky to travel around the world and that you wish it were you.   I sometimes wish it were you too and that I could just stay home, read, give Suzi a wish list for each meal and try to burn through a cord or two of oak in our fireplace.  But reality is different, and I find myself with an emptiness in my stomach, feeling homesick before I ever leave.

The ambivalence of arriving in Rome with a cold and my luggage still somewhere at Heathrow keeps me from going to my favorite dive in the ghetto for baby artichokes fried in olive oil.  Instead, I sleep for eight hours and have a marginally decent pizza in the hotel bar (how bad can a pizza be in Rome?).

Finally I catch the last train to Chiusi and meet up with Marcello, owner of Terrecotte San Rocco.  We drive to his home in the hills of Siena where his wife and mother, Nona, have a pot of pesto al Genovese ready and tonight a platter full of prosciutto and a variety of salumi.  It could definitely be worse.  After dinner Nona brings out a small bottle of deep amber liquid, a Christmas gift from an old friend.  There are no labels or foil and it looks to be hand-corked.  My mouth begins to water.  I hope it is a local Vin Santo.  The pruny, sherry-like liquid makes me almost forget the three dozen oysters and magnum of champagne we had with our daughter in Brooklyn on Christmas morning.  Almost.

New Years Eve day we are off to a nearby town for a big antique fair.  It is sparsely attended which gives me a little breathing room to adjust to my antiquing personality.  Walking up and down the steep cobblestone streets of the ancient Tuscan hill town is hard work and makes me hungry.  There is not time to sit down to the wonderful food in a local restaurant, but I find a nice salumeria and a sandwich of excellent prosciutto, pecorino and to my friend’s surprise, a few thin slices of lardo.  A glass of local vino rosso in a plastic cup and I’m back pounding the cobbles.  I find many interesting, but highly priced items, and then find a dealer who wants to bargain…

Below are some photos of some beautiful antiques that I found during my trip to the antique fair.  More to come!

On New Year’s Day I wake up late but I’m glad that the house is quiet.  It allows me to organize my week ahead at the factory.  My partner, Marcello, is the most progressive manufacturer in Italy.  In the afternoon he shows me a new factory he just started with a partner to produce quality terracotta for large garden centers.  While older, traditional terracotta manufacturers are going out of business, Marcello is buying their factories and their molds and working to develop new items.  Our association with this man and his business is becoming to be the backbone of Eye of the Day.

Next week:

Bologna and a little spaghetti.  After that I’m off to France to pick up a special order for a new landscape architecture firm wanting pots from Anduze that we don’t have in stock.  It will be an experiment renting a truck in Italy, driving to France for the pots and take them back to Italy to put on the container.  We are about to find out if this will be less expensive, faster and more productive than shipping by truck from France to Italy or shipping by pallet from Marseille.

At least once each year I travel to our various factories in Europe. Sure, it sounds exciting and romantic, but I hate to say it – after a while it becomes routine, repetitive and I would really like to be home in my own bed. My current trip has been especially important since 2010 was such a difficult year and our commitment to Terrecotte San Rocco requires a much higher level of involvement and communication with them than ever before.

As always, I flew to Rome and stayed at my usual hotel for a day and a half to recover before driving three hours north to Siena. During my recovery I like to head straight to the Jewish Ghetto to a little restaurant called Sora Margherita (Daisy or Eye of the Day in English). Their logo is a simple flower created with lights. Though the handmade pasta is over the top, it’s the olive oil-fried artichokes that keep me coming back.

It was a great pleasure driving four hours over the Apennine Mountains from Florence to Vicenza to meet with the owner of our stone factory to pick up a special-order fountain top for a customer. We made it there through driving snow, but had to stop in Bologna on our way back to wait out the storm. We spent a day and a half with our partner in Athens arguing with the shipper. If anyone wants to ship from Greece, we’ll tell you who NOT to ship with.

Coming home will be wonderful! We’re ready to meet the workload and on-coming Spring at Eye of the Day.
Brent

Here we are at our first show at the Dallas Market in Texas in their new area, “OUTDOOR LIVING”. There will be tens of thousands of people shopping here for the next week and Eye of the Day is surrounded by other companies selling their furniture, pottery, umbrellas and garden related products. We have received a wonderful welcome by those who have stopped by our showroom, mostly designers and high-end furniture store types. We may have found our partner/distributor for Houston. I will change my schedule when I return from Italy in February to visit them for a day.

As always, we find that Eye of the Day’s merchandise is drooled over by everyone and appreciated most by those in search of “high-quality authentic” products not just unique but impossible to find in today’s world of cheap reproductions from Asia. At Eye of the Day we continue our journey toward the goal of becoming the premier vendor and source of design-tradition and quality garden products in the USA.

Just when we think we’ve arrived at our final destination…  Just when we think we can concentrate on the project at hand…  Brent takes a little side trip on his way home from visiting Daisy in New York and… Voila!

An exciting, new appendage for Eye of the Day: DALLAS!  The idea was to work with another retailer in Dallas, but a container of Terrecotte San Rocco was more than they could deal with.  Brent did a bit of “sight-seeing” and landed us at the Dallas Market Center, where we will have a permanent showroom featuring a fantastic display of (drum roll…) TERRACOTTA!  And, of course some additional Eye of the Day products will be featured as well.  We have been working like frantic little elves to ship our display to the Center in time to set it up for the January Total Home & Gift Market 2011, which will take place January 19-25, 2011.

Lifting a little from their website…

“When buyers want the best selection of home and gift products, they head straight to Dallas Total Home & Gift Market.  In total, more than 20,000 gift items and decorative accessory product lines are represented in permanent showrooms…”

We think Dallas will be an excellent match for us as another way to assist the trade community throughout the country in providing the best quality garden pieces for their clients.

Plus…  Brent just wants to see us stretch.