Decorating with Vintage Clothing

I've become fascinated lately with using vintage clothing as decor.  Over the last few months, I've run across an amazing beaded flapper dress, two sweet christening gowns, and some beautiful lingerie from the fifties (bed jackets with lace and nightgowns) that I've ended up using in the little vignettes I like to scatter around my home.   

My window treatments are extremely simple; vintage priscilla curtains, lace curtains which I tea dye, or solid-color sheets that I purchase on sale.  I'm sure that you know how to make a curtain that way, right?  Just open the top hem of the sheet with a seam ripper, the part of the sheet you'd fold over the blanket when making the bed, and stick a rod through it.  I use wide ribbons marked down from Michaels as tie backs and often fasten the handle of a pretty vintage tea cup into the bow.  I've been using vintage clothes to dress up these windows on the cheap. 

In the pic above, the darling Battenberg lace dress and child's hat from the fifites were under $5 together.  The ceramic birds were from Goodwill and The Dollar Store.  I took the picture in sepia tones.  I love how it turned out.

I've hung adult clothes on vintage wooden or satin lingerie hangers that I pick up cheaply at thrift stores.  I hang the bigger garments on the rod, right on top of the curtain with some pretty spectacular results.   These lovely old dresses or nighties that I pick up cheaply (my rule is that they must be under $5) look casually stunning hung over a bedroom door from the top, with some coordinating old costume jewelry hanging with them.  It is easy to find things which coordinate with any color scheme.  I like to imagine that the pink and white bed jacket with roses and white nighties were left hanging on my bedroom door by a fomer resident of 256 Constitution Avenue, taking me right back to the 1940's. 

Simple,white baby clothes look lovely tea-dyed, starched, and hung against old windows resuced from the street and used for display.  Finally, I like those wooden accordian-type hanging affairs that you might see in a kitchen or laundry room for display.  You know the kind that you find at garage sales and thrift stores.  I spray paint them white and hang starched baby clothes, and even battered baby shoes, from the posts, along with charming flowered vintage plates, and hydrangea bouquets from the front yard.  You can created a unique, personalized display for a very small price.