Transcript
Speaker: Hello and welcome to Curious Objects, brought to you by the magazine Antiques.
Speaker: I'm Ben Miller.
Speaker: My guests today have done something that many people would have you believe is impossible.
Speaker: They've started a brand new antiques business.
Speaker: And not only that, they're selling to new and often to young collectors.
Speaker: And they've done it in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, which is supposed to be the world capital of millennial hypness.
Speaker: And to stop it all off, they themselves were brand new to the antiques business when they kicked this whole thing off a few years ago.
Speaker: In fact, the origin story for their business is totally unorthodox, and it's quintessentially New York.
Speaker: The company is called Salt Lizard.
Speaker: And of course, we're going to talk about where that unique name comes from.
Speaker: And I just want to be clear, this isn't some kind of quote-unquote vintage shop that mostly sells mid-century minimalism.
Speaker: No, Salt Lizard is making a go of selling exactly the kinds of pieces that we've all been told no one wants anymore.
Speaker: In a word, old-fashioned.
Speaker: Yet, they are popping off on Instagram.
Speaker: They have a bustling street-level shopfront in Brooklyn, and just a couple years in, I think we can already say that Salt Lizard is proving the pessimists and the naysayers wrong.
Speaker: And so on today's episode, I want to figure out how.
Speaker: So I'm so excited to be talking with co-founders Rita Nieme and Lizzie Trinder.
Speaker: We're going to learn the secrets of success in the antiques market for millennials.
Speaker: What magic are they tapping into?
Speaker: And what does that mean for the rest of us enthusiasts, collectors, and dealers?
Speaker: We're going to talk about their crazy improbable origin story, how they find unique pieces that are full of character and storytelling, and how one particular piece, today's curious object, could add a unique international flavor to your home.
Speaker: Rita and Lizzie, welcome to the podcast.
Speaker: Wow, what a great intro.
Speaker: Thanks, Ben.
Speaker: We're happy to be here.
Speaker: The pleasure is all mine.
Speaker: Let's start with some rapid fire questions.
Speaker: Are you game?
Speaker: Let's do it.
Speaker: What's the oldest object in your shop?
Speaker: So I think at the moment we have this lava bow, which is essentially like a wash basin from France.
Speaker: From France.
Speaker: 1810, I believe, is the year it's from.
Speaker: And we just think the mahogany wood is...
Speaker: impeccable and the porcelain basin is transferware as well so it's just i think we got it during the height of of covid so it was just so appropriate that a wash basin came into our hands okay this is a tricky one but can you describe your personal taste in one sentence
Speaker: Oh boy.
Speaker: I would say eclectic and fun with like a little bit of a little bit of flair.
Speaker: You know, we like anything that's different and interesting.
Speaker: Anything with personality.
Speaker: Yeah, I think for me, it's it's.
Speaker: We always say we don't take it too seriously.
Speaker: We don't have a specific era.
Speaker: But, you know, I personally love a piece covered in gold.
Speaker: I think anything gilded is beautiful.
Speaker: And yeah, I think all of our furniture just has these like unique signatures of their makers that are really interesting to us.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Anything covered with gold.
Speaker: Love the maximalism.
Speaker: Yeah, why not?
Speaker: What's the most exciting thing you've bought in the last month?
Speaker: Oh, that's the Gustav lamp.
Speaker: We got this floor lamp that's around like five feet tall, I think, 65 inches high.
Speaker: I don't know if you want to talk about it.
Speaker: It's called The Leaving, and it depicts a man.
Speaker: It's in bronze.
Speaker: It's like a sculpture in bronze that's holding a stained glass lamp at the top.
Speaker: And the bronze part is...
Speaker: a man embracing a woman with another woman at the base sort of like holding her hands up to the man and woman sort of pleading with them it looks like in a way and so you know you can obviously tell this is some sort of like scorned lover situation and you know it just it screens drama the whole thing
Speaker: I love a good storytelling object.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: What movie has the most interesting depiction of antiques?
Speaker: oh um i recently watched the um what's that show about it was about the killing of gianni versace um because american american horror story yeah and to me i mean i did say i love everything covered in gold but his house in the in the tv series i was just like did they shop at salt lizard this is amazing
Speaker: I would want in my mansion in Miami.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: What's your favorite museum to visit?
Speaker: Hands down the Met.
Speaker: Well, first, it's open on Mondays and that's our day off.
Speaker: So that's an important.
Speaker: And it's in New York.
Speaker: Museums are open on Mondays.
Speaker: That's very true.
Speaker: But I could just go and stare at the Impressionist paintings for hours.
Speaker: I could just stay in that section.
Speaker: And then obviously, you know, when you get tired of that, you can go somewhere else.
Speaker: There's so many different wings.
Speaker: So we're proud.
Speaker: met card carrying members excellent yeah i go there most days uh of the week actually at lunchtime and i feel like you know i've been to that museum hundreds and hundreds of times there's still entire rooms i'm sure i've never been in what's been your most viral instagram post
Speaker: Vanna White when you pretended to be Vanna White.
Speaker: Oh yeah.
Speaker: We had this Edwardian satin wood cheval mirror and so the mirror would actually like twist on itself so we made this reel where Lizzie pretended to be Vanna White.
Speaker: And she, you know, opened, opened the mirror as, as Vanna does.
Speaker: And I thought that was pretty cute.
Speaker: I think it's really funny.
Speaker: What's the, what's the first piece that you remember falling in love with?
Speaker: I was really obsessed and I was trying to keep it for a while with this Jacobean chest on stand.
Speaker: It's Spanish.
Speaker: It's like a Vaguerano piece.
Speaker: And I was like, I have to have this piece.
Speaker: And then I realized that's not how you run a business.
Speaker: We actually sold it to one of our neighbors in Williamsburg.
Speaker: I'm very happy that she's nearby.
Speaker: Well, you pretty quickly discovered the paradox of antique dealing.
Speaker: You want everything that you have.
Speaker: Yeah, it's always a struggle.
Speaker: What's a mistake you've made in the business that you regret and maybe learn something from?
Speaker: You know, I would say we...
Speaker: I don't think we regret anything.
Speaker: The business is like pretty, pretty new still.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And, and we're still learning every day.
Speaker: I mean, every time we talk to a customer, we're learning every, you know, every day is different in, in retail and, um,
Speaker: We could say that we've bought things for too much and then realized, so how are we going to sell this?
Speaker: But I wouldn't say it's necessarily a regret.
Speaker: It's just like we're still learning.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: What was the last interior you saw that inspired you?
Speaker: Our house.
Speaker: Every day our house inspires us.
Speaker: Inspired by yourselves.
Speaker: Nice.
Speaker: We are.
Speaker: We really do love our home.
Speaker: We're also very much homebodies.
Speaker: Clearly, you know, with COVID and up till now, we've kind of really changed how we live our lives, especially running a business.
Speaker: So our home is really, really sacred to us and we're roommates.
Speaker: So we're sitting together on this couch, you know, just...
Speaker: It's a refuge for us and it's beautiful and it's constantly inspiring us to get up and go help other people have apartments like ours.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: Love to hear that.
Speaker: And we'll be back in just a second with Rita and Lizzie.
Speaker: Meanwhile, take a second just to make sure you're subscribed to the podcast in Apple Podcasts or Spotify or wherever you're listening.
Speaker: And we've got some great episodes coming up that you won't want to miss.
Speaker: And while you're at it, do me a favor and drop us a rating and maybe even a little review to let us know how we're doing and to help new listeners discover curious objects.
Speaker: And that can honestly just be a few words.
Speaker: It won't take more than a second, but it really helps to spread the message about these fascinating and important objects and stories and ideas.
Speaker: And if you'd like to see pictures of the pieces we're talking about today, you can find those as always at themagazineantiques.com slash podcast, or of course at saltlizardnyc.com.
Speaker: They're also on Instagram at saltlizardnyc, as am I, at Objective Interest.
Speaker: With that, let's get back to Rita, Lizzie, and Salt Lizard.
Speaker: So tell me, what does Salt Lizard mean?
Speaker: What do you mean?
Speaker: It's not obvious?
Speaker: Maybe not to me.
Speaker: We get this question a lot in store, but it's pretty much a blend of our nicknames.
Speaker: So Rita is Salt.
Speaker: and I Lizzie and Lizard and when we were coming up with the name we were just you know lying on the couch one day sort of brainstorming and Rita just said well what about salt lizard I think I said salt and lizard and then you said to drop the amp yeah and I was like genius
Speaker: And then we went to tell Lizzie's parents and a salt lizard is an actual animal and it's only found on the Galapagos.
Speaker: And when her parents circumnavigated the world in the 80s, they went to the Galapagos and they were like, wait, we have a photo of a salt lizard.
Speaker: So it just like kind of was very like, it just all fit together.
Speaker: And it seemed right.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And we have that photo on our website and also framed in the store of a salt lizard.
Speaker: Sorry, my incredible friend, Tina designed our logo and it's a lizard on a candelabra, which I think is very fitting for the, it really tied the whole name and an idea and who we are together.
Speaker: I love a good candelabra.
Speaker: That's actually what I want for is Halloween this year.
Speaker: That's a story for another time.
Speaker: The pictures, the photos have been burned.
Speaker: So you're starting to allude to this, but I think the origin story of Salt Lizard is so fascinating.
Speaker: And I want you to share for listeners just how this whole thing got off the ground.
Speaker: So Rita and I are roommates and have been for quite some time.
Speaker: And during COVID, we had moved into this old brownstone in in Stuyvesant Heights in Bed-Stuy.
Speaker: And it was one of those those old homes that still has
Speaker: sink rooms in every room so these like small um completely wainscoted like floor and including ceiling rooms with these marble basins and all of them still worked and
Speaker: And we were just like totally in awe of this space and really wanted to work with it.
Speaker: So we started furnishing through, you know, like estate sales and auctions and
Speaker: and sort of wherever we could find, you know, cheap, cheap antiques and sort of realized that we had a knack for it.
Speaker: And we also worked really well together, had all the same ideas when it came to how to how we wanted to furnish the place.
Speaker: And as we were doing it, we were sort of like, well,
Speaker: You know, we are having we're we think we're pretty good at this.
Speaker: Why don't we see if anyone wants to like buy something that we that we've bought?
Speaker: So we created an Instagram account and we just sort of tried to buy.
Speaker: does anyone want to buy this?
Speaker: And people started buying things.
Speaker: And I think it was during that sweet spot of COVID where every Instagram was a little bit of a different beast and everyone was at home on their phones wanting to make their home space nice.
Speaker: And we just got in at the right moment.
Speaker: It was also, it was a time where people were buying on Instagram.
Speaker: It wasn't crazy to do that.
Speaker: There were so many people working from home, selling handmade things, even handmade masks at the time.
Speaker: And so there was this kind of weird trust in people on Instagram.
Speaker: And when we had bought a few things on Instagram,
Speaker: So it was, yeah, I don't think it would have worked before then.
Speaker: Or after.
Speaker: I don't think it would work now, to be honest.
Speaker: So, yeah, I think we just, it was like the perfect moment in time for us in which all of these things sort of aligned and,
Speaker: And we were able to get this start.
Speaker: And, you know, then Instagram led to a website.
Speaker: And then, you know, the website led to, well, we need somewhere for people to see stuff.
Speaker: So, like, let's get a story.
Speaker: And then, you know, a couple of years later, here we are.
Speaker: Here we are.
Speaker: So who do you think of you?
Speaker: You've described your business as a little bit different from anything else out there, but I wonder who you think of as being your competition, whether that's, you know, Ikea or West Elm or First Dibs or someone else.
Speaker: Who are you competing with?
Speaker: Oh, my goodness.
Speaker: Those are such huge names.
Speaker: I feel like, you know, we're such as maybe because our Instagram presence is large.
Speaker: People assume that it's more than two people.
Speaker: But we're still very much the only two employees.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, I think with Ikea and West End, like we kind of, you know, know that switching a customer who buys fast furniture to buy, you know, some ornate like
Speaker: antique piece is a little bit, it's a little bit hard to do.
Speaker: And because of our, our manpower as a, as a two person team, you know, we, we think more like our competition is like other local vintage and antique stores, especially those that sort of target millennials the way we do.
Speaker: I mean, we are millennials, but that's right.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I think it's a blessing that we found a place in Williamsburg because there are a few other furniture stores around us.
Speaker: But I think that we all have such a different style that it's been to all of our benefit that we're all in one area.
Speaker: And I think people come
Speaker: And they're like, okay, like what, where else can I go from here?
Speaker: And you know, there's Dobbin Street, there's Home Union, there's other places.
Speaker: And it feels like you can just furniture shop
Speaker: all day in one area.
Speaker: And that's like a good thing.
Speaker: And that's a good thing.
Speaker: We don't all your bases.
Speaker: We don't view that as a bad thing at all.
Speaker: It's like good to have these other small businesses selling furniture around.
Speaker: You know, there's enough to go around.
Speaker: There's enough for everyone.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: A rising tide lifts all boats.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: I sometimes think of my competition in the antiques business as being Netflix.
Speaker: Oh, in the sense that like what I'm fighting for is attention.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And time and effort and energy energy.
Speaker: Um, and so like you, you know, I would love to see,
Speaker: more and more and more quote unquote competition from other dealers.
Speaker: That would be fantastic news.
Speaker: And that's part of what's interesting about you guys, you know, bringing this new shop into existence out of nothing.
Speaker: So suddenly on the timescale of the antiques world,
Speaker: And so I guess I wonder, you mentioned that it's difficult to convert people from buying fast furniture to buying the kind of thing that you sell.
Speaker: But let's be honest, we've all bought fast furniture at one stage or another.
Speaker: And somebody at some point, for you guys, for me, for a lot of people listening to the podcast, somebody at some point
Speaker: said something or showed us something or we experienced something that made us think twice about that and maybe take a different approach.
Speaker: And I feel like that's a big part of what you guys are doing, at least it's what I see from you on Instagram, is that idea of just like, hey, step back for a second, take a second look at this, think about it from a slightly different angle.
Speaker: And maybe you'll find something super appealing and super satisfying in this world of antique buying and collecting that had not been on your mind before.
Speaker: I think you're completely right.
Speaker: And having Instagram, as much as it's a struggle sometimes to constantly be making
Speaker: I think it humanizes, maybe not humanizes, but it just makes it a little bit less stuffy and serious that we're being silly.
Speaker: We're talking about this furniture.
Speaker: Just come and see it.
Speaker: And I think that that experience of seeing the furniture and talking to people has changed a lot.
Speaker: how people buy things or at least the customers that have come in.
Speaker: But yeah, maybe our competition is really that like,
Speaker: buying something without having the experience of seeing it, without having the experience of talking to someone who actually sourced it.
Speaker: You know, our competition is like this, like removed buying process where you just buy online and it's shipped within two days, maybe.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Like for us, we're, you know, some people are like, oh, can I get this delivered tomorrow?
Speaker: And it's like, well, no.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That's not how it works.
Speaker: Maybe in like five days you can have it.
Speaker: Like there's some limitations.
Speaker: Yeah, but I think young people have maybe gotten the wrong idea about how to buy things or what's comfortable for them.
Speaker: And maybe the hardest thing is to be like, you don't need to just buy.
Speaker: not talk to anyone i mean it's like it's like me i can't like pick up the phone if it's a if it's number i don't know and so maybe bringing back that personal um experience and just talking to people and i think we're pretty friendly has been has been a way to to reach younger folks and and make them come in and
Speaker: And you don't have to buy something.
Speaker: Sometimes just coming into the store and spending some time there really is a real pleasure for people.
Speaker: People come in and spend time and just look at pieces.
Speaker: It's like a little museum.
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Speaker: So if I walk into an apartment that somebody has decorated with pieces that they got from you, from Salt Lizard, how is that experience going to be different from walking into an apartment that somebody has decorated with fast furniture from West Elm or whatever?
Speaker: Well, I think you especially would know the difference.
Speaker: I think you would have a bit more to talk about, perhaps.
Speaker: Or at least I would hope so.
Speaker: You know, you'd be drawn to something and be like, where did you get that?
Speaker: What's the story behind that?
Speaker: Like, yeah, that looks interesting.
Speaker: I think that's sort of...
Speaker: always the goal with stuff that we're selling and people are interested in our store, it's like, huh, what is that?
Speaker: Tell me a little bit more about that.
Speaker: Where did you get that?
Speaker: Where's that from?
Speaker: How old is it?
Speaker: Oh, that does what?
Speaker: A lot of time we have furniture that converts into something else, transformer style.
Speaker: That's true.
Speaker: And I think people people get a lot of joy from from stuff like that.
Speaker: So, yeah.
Speaker: So speaking of which, you have this piece that I alluded to earlier, this really interesting games table from the Levant.
Speaker: And I wonder if you could tell listeners what that looks like and then a little about why you bought it.
Speaker: Sure.
Speaker: So we tend to get a lot of games tables in general.
Speaker: We find that people really love them and some of them are more ornate than others.
Speaker: The one we have currently is Mother of Pearl.
Speaker: So it has all of these Mother of Pearl decoration throughout and it's a backgammon table, but also
Speaker: converts into a cards table and also a chess board and it can just be a console if you don't want if you don't want any of that it it
Speaker: folds up into just a little console you could put to the side to the side and um i mean some are from all over the world but this one in particular is from the levant it's either lebanese or syrian and we've had a few of them before i i am lebanese so i obviously go for a lot of middle eastern pieces
Speaker: They just I just think they're so beautiful.
Speaker: And in general, Middle Eastern or Islamic art and architecture is just really fascinating to me and, you know, tells a story on its own.
Speaker: So I think this games table and it's done really well on Instagram as well.
Speaker: It's just it's really eye catching.
Speaker: And, you know, where have you seen something like that before?
Speaker: It's just so, so different.
Speaker: So how do you actually imagine that piece fitting into a customer's home?
Speaker: Are they going to use it to play games?
Speaker: Yeah, that's so funny.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: A customer came in the other day and was just so impressed.
Speaker: And she's like, surely you can't use this.
Speaker: And, you know, I if you walk along the streets of Beirut, everyone's playing backgammon on these tables.
Speaker: It's actually, you know,
Speaker: it's up to you how how you want to use it or not use it if you feel like it's it's too nice to be used then you know that's your prerogative but i think because it can be folded up and stowed to the side you know you can bring it out during games night you could just have it as a conversation piece um it's it's entirely up to to the owner really yeah
Speaker: Do you get that a lot from your customers, the sort of fear of using these things that are so old and beautiful?
Speaker: Sometimes.
Speaker: It really depends on the customer.
Speaker: But I think a lot of antiquers or people who have a lot of these pieces understand how sturdy they are.
Speaker: And we have rugs all over the store, for example, and people sometimes come in and are scared to step on the rugs.
Speaker: And I always say, you know, these rugs can handle it.
Speaker: Antiques are made to kind of withstand time.
Speaker: A certain amount of, you know, where they've lasted this long.
Speaker: They'll last for fun.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: So I feel like
Speaker: We always have some sort of attachment to something we spent an X amount of dollars on.
Speaker: But at the end of the day, you know, we're all adults and can can use something without breaking it.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And also with these with these pieces.
Speaker: you know especially for us at home like if something were to to chip or break these are pieces that you can fix it's not like you know the fast furniture if it falls apart it falls apart like we all had a piece of ikea furniture disintegrate in front of us or something like that at some point right um and i think that's the beauty of
Speaker: of antiques and older pieces is that they're just made different.
Speaker: And so sometimes, you know, we can tell customers, you know, you don't have to be scared of this just because it looks a certain way.
Speaker: It doesn't have to be intimidating.
Speaker: Like you can touch it, you can use it.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And then also it can ideally reflect your own personal interest and taste as opposed to, you know, the marketing priorities of whatever the big mega corporations are interested in this season.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: Where do you actually go to buy this material?
Speaker: Wherever our van can take us.
Speaker: We have like a three hour radius that we drive and, you know, we've we've obviously built relationships and stuff over over the years that we've been doing this now.
Speaker: And so we have our.
Speaker: We have our contacts, you know, where we get our stuff to sell.
Speaker: And then we'll... So you're buying from what?
Speaker: From pickers, from estate sales, from shops in the Hudson Valley?
Speaker: We do a little bit of everything.
Speaker: We sort of don't limit ourselves, you know, auctions or estate sales or, you know, little places here and there.
Speaker: Any dealers that we have relationships with.
Speaker: So how much time do you actually spend on the road?
Speaker: So usually either Monday or Tuesday is a whole day on the road.
Speaker: And then there's some mornings where one of us will go.
Speaker: We have storage in Long Island and also one in New Jersey.
Speaker: And so if we need to refill the store, one of us will go and yeah.
Speaker: get pieces that are carryable by one person.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Like to say.
Speaker: But yeah, I,
Speaker: There's always a pickup.
Speaker: Yeah, every week we're out somewhere doing something different, which is also why we love what we do, right?
Speaker: We get to see different parts of the East Coast and, you know.
Speaker: Meet some interesting characters.
Speaker: Meet some interesting folks, yeah.
Speaker: And find...
Speaker: really cool pieces we've never seen before.
Speaker: So we're out there every week doing that.
Speaker: Do you have customers who have sort of decked out their whole house or their whole apartment in Salt Wizard?
Speaker: We get like diehards.
Speaker: If someone buys a couple of things and they're happy with it, like they'll furnish their whole house with us type thing.
Speaker: And so when we find like a customer that gets it, they like really get it.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And then, you know, there are others in between and stuff like that.
Speaker: It makes such a difference that we we've gotten to a level where we know our customers.
Speaker: And that's, you know, some people might prefer to just be online and not not speak to anyone.
Speaker: But I think our return customers actually come in person.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And, you know, call us ahead of time.
Speaker: And so there's some real friendships, I think.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So I remember another thing that happened during COVID, which was I saw all of these videos of people, quote unquote, restoring old pieces of furniture.
Speaker: And sometimes these were, you know, qualified professional restorers who really knew how to handle a piece and bring it back to its intended purpose.
Speaker: appearance in its full glory.
Speaker: Other times it was people buying, you know, often it was beautiful old wood furniture and then painting it over and turning it white, which obviously for many of us, that's painful to watch.
Speaker: But I wonder what your view is on, you know, repairing and restoring and repurposing old pieces.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: We're very pro.
Speaker: I mean, I think, like you said, it's still it's kind of a dying business to be a reupholster or someone who fixes or specializes in restoration of antique furniture.
Speaker: There's not that many people left, but they'll be around.
Speaker: But I think if you do a good job, I mean, again, you've given an entirely new life to a piece.
Speaker: especially repulsory.
Speaker: If you have a good frame for a chair or sofa, we're very pro getting some fabric and make it your own.
Speaker: Make it your own.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: As far as painting it, I've seen those videos.
Speaker: I actually, there was one video I saw where it was a gold piece and they stripped the gilding and I got so sad.
Speaker: Oh, that must have been so painful for you.
Speaker: Like, oh no.
Speaker: So, but to each their own.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And if it's going to keep something out of a landfill, you know, as long as you're not destroying some, you know, priceless work of art piece, I would say, you know,
Speaker: Go for it.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: I love, you know, in silver, I see that all the time.
Speaker: Of course, people are always melting things down.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Sometimes that's a terrible mistake and it's very painful to hear about.
Speaker: And other times you think, well, nothing really of value is lost here.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Okay, so you're both, I think it's fair to say you're generalists.
Speaker: Your shop handles all kinds of different material.
Speaker: But I'm curious whether you ever find yourself taking a deep dive into some specific category.
Speaker: Maybe you come across an object that just enchants you and you want to learn everything about that category, that form.
Speaker: Do you dive down rabbit holes like that?
Speaker: Oh, for sure.
Speaker: Well, I would say that everything that we sell, we research, right?
Speaker: And so we're always learning new things about new places and where something comes from and artists and all of that.
Speaker: Um, and then like specifically like Rita, you, you're, I'm into Wedgwood, um, stoneware at the moment.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: A lot of Wedgwood, um, Jasperware for me, I think the, especially the Wedgwood blue is, um,
Speaker: I don't know if you've ever seen it, but it's just very calming color.
Speaker: The fact that the actual like tone of the blue and the mattingness of how it's made and how it's made is just so it's so intricate.
Speaker: And we actually got in a collection of.
Speaker: There are these Jasperware Wedgwood catchers, but someone converted them into lighters.
Speaker: So we got like these 30 Wedgwood lighters.
Speaker: And I think, you know, speaking of the millennials, they were, I think a lot of Brooklyn bought these lighters.
Speaker: They're like, well, how do we fix them?
Speaker: So I just, you know, would send them a YouTube video of how to replace the wick and the foot and the little, you know,
Speaker: the little wheel and you know, you just have now a working lighter.
Speaker: It's just so much more impressive to have a hedgewood lighter than your, than your Bic lighter.
Speaker: I think.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: That's how you get the millennial market.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: So smoke, yeah.
Speaker: Smoking paraphernalia.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It's in.
Speaker: I wonder why you think it is that there aren't more shops around like yours.
Speaker: I think like we mentioned before, there are so many huge conglomerates of these fast furniture businesses.
Speaker: And especially in New York where we are, I mean, we've moved so often that you just end up not trusting your purchases or you don't trust that like you'll be here for another year in this apartment.
Speaker: So why invest when you might be moving?
Speaker: And I think
Speaker: to us, what really changed everything was the fact that we were forced to be at home for so long.
Speaker: And we were like, actually, this home needs needs to be a space where we are calm, where we are looking at things that are interesting instead of just having the essentials, just having a dining room table and some chairs.
Speaker: And so
Speaker: You know, maybe now there'll be more shops like ours, I hope so.
Speaker: But there definitely aren't that many local furniture shops, at least to me, I don't think there's enough.
Speaker: So thinking about the future of Salt Lizard, I wonder if you would ever want to specialize once you've found that one category of piece that really sings to you where you keep going down that rabbit hole over and over again,
Speaker: Or, you know, or maybe if you have ambitions to increase your price point or on the other hand, maybe to sort of expand outward, open new stores, where do you see Salt Lizard going from here?
Speaker: I mean, I would say that we're we're always dreaming, right?
Speaker: We're always dreaming of what could be next, what what's next for us.
Speaker: But at the moment, we're we're very much in the like, let's make what we're doing work and let's make it like really work.
Speaker: And then and then we'll see we'll see what exactly is next.
Speaker: But, you know, in terms of of specializing in something in particular, I think,
Speaker: Our store sells all sorts of things that, you know, we've handpicked because they bring us great joy and we think they could bring other people great joy.
Speaker: And that variety is sort of part of our personality.
Speaker: So I don't think we'll ever specialize just because that's sort of who we are.
Speaker: We like to see things we've never seen before.
Speaker: We want to show other people things they've never seen before that cross a whole bunch of different eras and...
Speaker: And cultures.
Speaker: Cultures, yes, absolutely.
Speaker: And so that fundamentally, I don't think will ever change for us.
Speaker: But yeah, I mean, we're excited to see to see where this goes to and see what our next step will be once, you know, where we're we're ready for that.
Speaker: Stay tuned.
Speaker: Yeah, stay tuned.
Speaker: Okay, stay tuned.
Speaker: And meanwhile, check out their website, check out their Instagram and go visit the shop.
Speaker: It's a fun place, I have to say.
Speaker: I feel like every time I turn a corner, I'm seeing something surprising and new and interesting.
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: Lizzie and Rita, thanks so much.
Speaker: This has been a lot of fun.
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: Today's episode was edited and produced by Sammy Delati with social media and web support from Sarah Bellotta.
Speaker: Sierra Holt is our digital media and editorial associate.
Speaker: Our music is by Trap Rabbit.
Speaker: And I'm Ben Miller.
Speaker: When you walk into a Burlington, you're walking into amazing prices and great gifts.
Speaker: That's main character energy.
Speaker: Because at Burlington, the holiday savings aren't the only things turning heads.
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