Latest news with #heirloom
The Irish Sun
16-07-2025
- Entertainment
- The Irish Sun
Classic Books are booming but it's the famous authors' cache not the literature that are the money spinners
Classic literature is enjoying a sudden surge, but it's the value of the books rather than the words in them that is generating a sales boom. Pawnbrokers are reporting a massive climb in the number of books it is offered for sale or for their owners to take out temporary loans. Advertisement 3 James Constantinou, owner of posh Prestige pawn chain, claims that classic books are having a moment Credit: Lancton - Fabulous Harry Potter books are making magic returns with £10,000-plus for mint condition first editions but classics from Enid Blyton and Fyodor Dostoevsky are also big money-spinners, says James Constantinou, owner of the Prestige Pawn chain. 'We're seeing a major shift with a 300% increase in book submissions this year,' adds James, star of the hit Channel 4 TV show Posh Pawn. 'Books are now being treated like art, jewellery or watches – rare, cultural items that hold and grow in value and people are starting to realise how much hidden value they've got at home.' A flawless first edition of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, which was part of an original US print run, recently secured a £10,000 loan, while translation of works by Dostoevsky and Paul Dirac have been valued at around £4,000. Advertisement Read more 'These editions, printed in the UK with gold-inlaid spines, are significantly more valuable than their US counterparts. In one case, a customer pawned these classics to fund the purchase of an original Russian translation.' said James. 'Books are resilient, long-term investments - with loan valued climbing by 5-7% annually - and that goes for everything from classic literature to children's book,s with a first edition of The Wind in the Willows selling for £32,400, and rare Enid Blyton books fetching up to £1,000. 'Last year, we were getting five book submissions a week but that has tripled and there is a real feeling that people are becoming more aware of their value so it is worth checking out your bookshelves for any family heirloom first editions that could be worth a small fortune.' Rare Harry Potter books have good resale value but they are eclipsed by a first edition of Odyssey by James Joyce printed on handmade paper which was sold for £275,000 while first edition of F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby have been valued at £245,000. Advertisement Most read in Fabulous Exclusive Exclusive 3 The iconic first edition of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone which can fetch up to £20,000 Credit: SWNS 3 Enid Blyton books are also raking in large figures Credit: Alamy
Yahoo
04-07-2025
- Lifestyle
- Yahoo
14 Luxury Baby Gifts to Please Any Parent
"Hearst Magazines and Yahoo may earn commission or revenue on some items through these links." Certain milestones in life, like the arrival of a baby, call for the type of gift that will last forever. And, if you're lucky, these objects get passed down to the next generation. We searched high and low for the sort of luxury present that will stick around for a long time to come. Perhaps a sterling silver bubble blower or baby cup will delight both the parent and the bauble's young owner. Or an heirloom-worthy Murano picture frame will beautifully suit a photo of one of the world's newest members. What could be more delightful, and adorable, than a Moncler winter suit to keep even the youngest among us cozy? And, for the sentimental type, our favorite gift that keeps growing: A tree in the baby's honor. Here, our favorite luxury presents to delight even the hardest to please something so adorable about a plush baby bathrobe. Plus, this version can be personalized. $60.00 at to make all of those memories last? Smythson's leather-bound baby book is sturdy and will hold up well for years to come. It can be personalized with names or notes. $625.00 at David Mellor baby cutlery set is both playful and stylish. $92.00 at Elsa Peretti-designed sterling bubble blower may seem impractical, but it will surely become a keepsake down the line. It can function as a bubble blower through childhood and then as a chic cocktail stirrer in adulthood. $200.00 at Firenze has been in business for years and it's hard to find linens more luxurious. Both baby and parents will surely appreciate this sweet hand-embroidered towel set. $350.00 at modaoperandiThis luxurious cashmere cable-knit day gown arrives on a satin hanger and is both plush and precious. $325.00 at more luxurious than a baby having his or her own set of china? This version includes a cup, bowl, plate, and egg cup. $273.00 at is the gold standard for stuffed animals, and the 7 inch llama is size-appropriate for a baby. $22.95 at tiny Moncler suit, with bear ears on the hood, is hard not to appreciate. $450.00 at pewter baby cup will certainly be passed on to the next generation. $110.00 at this vintage Murano frame with a photo of the new baby for the ultimate unique gift. $2433.00 at leather bound version of The Night Before Christmas can personalized with names. It's sure to be a gift that will be enjoyed year after year. $98.00 at overthemoonAerin Lauder's pointelle baby blanket includes sweet details like an embroidered flower border and a faint baby blue trim. $69.00 at could be more special than the gift of a tree? It not only gives back to the people and place where it grows, but also signifies the passing of time. Years later, the whole family can even pay the tree a visit. $129.00 at You Might Also Like From the Archive: Tour Sarah Jessica Parker's Relaxed Hamptons Retreat 75 Small (But Mighty) Kitchens to Steal Inspiration from Right This Instant
New York Times
28-06-2025
- Entertainment
- New York Times
Brianne Howey Feels a Presence Through Her Bracelet
Brianne Howey has a supernatural connection with her late grandmother, who's 'come through' by way of mediums, and a one-time séance that used her grandmother's bracelet to guide otherworldly energy into the room. The star of Netflix's hit show 'Ginny & Georgia,' currently in its third season and remains one of the network's top 10 shows after two weeks, wears a gold serpentine heirloom most days. 'It just makes me feel like I'm with my grandma,' she said of the transcendental link. In an interview, Ms. Howey reflected on the bracelet that is, as she put it, 'a physical manifestation' of her memories and her love. This interview has been edited and condensed. How did this bracelet find its way to you? After my grandma passed in 2022, one of my aunts told me that she had left it for me with my name on it, on a Post-it with the bracelet. It's so, so special to me. Did your grandma wear lots of other jewelry, or was this her main piece? Not that much, actually. She was kind of a minimalist. My grandma was a really practical woman. She had eight kids. She was a nurse, very Catholic, not a lot of bells and whistles. So that makes this even more sentimental. My grandma was also the kind of person who, anytime she lost something, she would whip out her St. Christopher beads. She had a lot of rosaries. That was more her jewelry. There would be a rosary around her neck, in every pocket, and she would know exactly who to pray to if you lost something, if you were sick, if I was nervous about a test, anything. Do you wear it every day? It's like a wedding band, almost: I feel kind of naked without it on, and it's so delicate and comfortable and it lays so flat, and it makes me feel so close to my grandma because my parents had me super young. I was really raised so much by my grandparents, so it's just extra special. I have sort of a roller coaster of a past with my jewelry collection. Twice in my life I've been robbed. And all my jewelry got stolen. So I've sort of been rebuilding. But both times, my grandma's bracelet, I've always had it. It never got stolen, so that's why it's extra sentimental. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
Yahoo
25-06-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Texas Woman Thought Her 115-Year-Old Heirloom Wedding Ring Was Forever Lost in a Lake Until a Diver Found It: 'He Didn't Give Up on It'
Texas wife and mother JackO'Lynn Page lost her heirloom wedding ring at a local lake over the weekend She had been at the lake with her son's baseball team and their families, who all "jumped into action" to help look for the ring Ultimately, Ryan Prigmore with Blue Diver Search and Recovery arrived at Possum Kingdom Lake and found the diamondA Texas woman has been reunited with her wedding ring after a recent trip to a local lake left her feeling like she'd never see the diamond again. JackO'Lynn Page shared details about the ordeal and her happy ending on her Facebook page on Monday, June 23. According to the wife and mother, as well as KDFW, Page was spending the day at Possum Kingdom Lake with her son's baseball team over the weekend, even though, admittedly, she isn't a fan of lake activities. However, the day was going by just fine because 'we were with our friends & truly having a blast,' but it soon took a turn, Page wrote. 'I realized my wedding ring was gone from my finger!' 'Our team jumped into action looking for it. Picture 11 baseball boys with goggles, moms, dads grandparents everyone was looking! But no luck. I was heartbroken,' she added. Unable to locate the wedding ring, which was a 1910 heirloom per KDFW, one of the fathers present suggested they reach out to a professional. Ryan Prigmore with Blue Diver Search and Recovery arrived and searched for a few hours, but was unable to locate Page's ring because 'the weather & water conditions that afternoon were making the search very difficult.' Possum Kingdom Lake is a manmade lake created in 1941 with over 17,000 surface acres and over 300 miles of shoreline, according to its official website. "I was getting thrashed by the waves, but I gave my word that I would be back to keep trying," Prigmore said, per KDFW. The diver promised Page he would return Monday to continue the search when the weather was calmer. 'He kept his word," Page wrote on Facebook. Her post included a photo of someone holding the wedding ring after it was retrieved. A person standing next to diving equipment with the lake in the distance could also be seen in the picture. 'I am so thankful for him! He didn't give up on it. I had been preparing myself for the last few days that it was lost and I wouldn't see it again. My ring is so special to me. And I had no idea how I'd get over this. I'm am over the moon knowing it's coming home to me!!' Page's post concluded. According to Blue Diver Search and Recovery's Facebook account, the organization 'is the only honest to God 24hr dive service throughout Texas.' In May 2022, Prigmore helped a man find his "prized Rolex at Eagle Mountain Lake," per the organization's reviews. Read the original article on People
The Guardian
09-06-2025
- General
- The Guardian
‘This Dutch oven keeps my mother's memory alive': readers' kitchen treasures
A few weeks ago, Bee Wilson wrote about how people sometimes invest kitchen items with strong meanings as they pass through generations. Here, four readers share stories of such treasured heirlooms, from copper pots from India to a cast-iron spatula from Italy. Priya Deshingkar, Brighton and Hove This handmade, hammered copper pot belonged to my grandmother on my father's side and was probably made for her by the local coppersmith in her village in southern Maharashtra in the 1920s. Shirol, which is now a town, is around 1,000 miles (1,705km) from Delhi, where I lived with my parents. We sometimes visited for our summer holidays in the 70s, which took at least two days by train. The pace of life there was slow. Back then it was routine to re-tin the inside of pots and pans because you couldn't cook anything acidic in copper. Travelling kalaiwallahs, as they were called, would come around to do it every couple of months or so. At that time, the tinning of copper (kalai) was still common in India, even during my childhood. Now they've mostly disappeared and you only get a few left in every city as everyone is using aluminium or stainless steel. I haven't figured out how to tin here in the UK, so for now I can only use the pot for non-acidic foods. Tamarind, tomato or lime would eat away the copper and produce a toxic compound. I use it for a typically Maharashtrian dish my grandmother used to make called bharli vangi – aubergines stuffed with a mixture of spices and ground roasted peanuts, cooked with coriander and green chilies, and so on. Cooking with it reminds me of her and the life she lived. Despite coming from a well-to-do family, she was married at 14 and spent the best part of her youth toiling away and bringing up five children. She was a voracious reader and a thinker. Whenever she visited us in Delhi, my mother supplied her with reading material. The most common local language in Delhi is Hindi, but my grandmother read only in Marathi (the predominant language in Maharashtra), so my mother had to go to libraries and friends' houses to find stacks of books. She got through so many that my mother got fed up, saying: 'How much does this woman read?' I often think about how different my grandmother's life might have been had she had the chance to pursue a career of her choice. After my grandmother died in 1975, the pot travelled to my parents' house in Delhi, where it was until I brought it with me to the UK in the mid-1980s. The pot sits proudly in my kitchen, waiting to receive another coating of tin. I will pass it on to my daughters and hope that it continues to keep memories alive in my family. Thomas Pickett, Santa Cruz in California, US When my mother died in 1987, at the age of 56, it was mostly junk that she left behind. She was too busy living to accumulate anything of much value. We were left with boxes of cooking utensils, camping gear, clothes and books. We sat among the tools of her life stunned that she was gone for ever. Mom was not terribly attached to the material aspects of life; she was more attached to people, to laughter and argument. I looked over the boxes for something that would keep her memory alive for me, and lifted out her old Wagner drip-drop baster Dutch oven. When cooking, she would start by opening the pot cupboard. It usually came with a string of expletives as most of the pots fell off the shelf at once. She'd lift the Dutchy's substantial weight on to the counter, get a cutting board, a knife and a cookbook and start chopping. She'd cook something up for anyone who was home and would open a bottle of wine and share conversation, stories and laughter. The history of my mother's life and her spirit was represented in that cast-iron pot. I'm a retired chef, and most cooks understand cast iron's absorptive nature and its ability to retain an oily, non-stick finish. For me, Mom's old Dutch oven not only had a well-oiled surface, it had the seasonings of her life. I have used it to cook decades of comfort food for my family. Our kids have left the nest and in their absence I've found Mom's pot wants to travel. Sometimes more than once a week, it's been sent full of steaming-hot food to friends' homes. Friends with the flu, friends living alone with memories of spouses lost to old age, or struggling with cancer who might like a friendly face and a shared meal. Riccardina Burdo, London The spatula, or rasaul, I use to shape orecchiette pasta was made in my home town of Andria, southern Italy, by local blacksmiths using wrought iron, a material chosen for its strength and longevity. The spatula is perfectly balanced: lightweight and easy to handle, with a rounded, non-sharp edge – ideal for shaping pasta without cutting it. This tool is essential for making orecchiette from small cylinders of pasta. The rasaul is not only key to getting the right look, it is essential for the right texture that defines true orecchiette. This one belonged to my grandmother. I learned to make orecchiette as a child, sitting next to her and my mother in the kitchen. They were so good I'd even eat some of them raw. I still use it, not out of nostalgia but because it is simply irreplaceable. While many in southern Italy now use a kitchen knife, I have never stopped using this tool, which allows me to shape orecchiette just as they used to be made. Every time I hold it, I feel a direct connection with my roots and with the generations of women in my family who shaped pasta on wooden cutting boards in warm and lively kitchens. I have a three-and-a-half-year-old granddaughter and she's already started making orecchiette with me. She's getting the gist – and of course she's always asking if she can eat them raw, too. Jean Baxter, Leicester When I got married in 1974, at the age of 19, my mum and dad gave me some things to start myself up. One of them was this plain, stainless steel dish, which my dad made. He worked for a company in Birmingham that made high-end, ornate gallery trays – but their bread and butter was the stainless steel serving dishes used by the curry and Balti restaurant trade. The company had a problem with the dish's curled rim, which would crease as it came off the jig – the tool holding components in place – creating lots of rejects. My dad redesigned the jig to make a perfect finish, and he brought home a couple of the prototypes he had made. They popped out thousands and thousands; we'd see them in Indian restaurants all the time. My dad was very clever, polishing off the Guardian cryptic crossword in less than 10 minutes most days. I'm still using his dish several times a week, 50 years and three marriages later. For me, it is a testament to my wonderfully funny, innovative, loving dad and it will be left to the grandchild who likes cooking the most.
