There’s not a vintage lolly jar or antique clock out of place in this carefully put together Balmain store. In one curated corner there’s European medicine balls from the ’30s and ’40s paired with antique fencing masks. In the window display, a collection of huge factory textile bobbins from England shrouded in bushels of cotton look more like a work of art than a practical tool.
This exacting style all comes down to the shop’s enthusiastic owner Leanne Carter-Taylor. She speaks a mile-a-minute in her Northern English accent, telling us about her strict and very personal standards for selecting antiques.
“I don’t apologise for anything I put in the store: I put in the store what I like and if other people do to, brilliant, if not, oh well,” she says, shrugging. “Everything’s original, nothing’s a reproduction.”
Since she’s been operating in this way for almost a decade, it seems Sydney likes Leanne’s approach. The diversity of what’s on the shelves probably helps too. There’s industrial-style stools and light fixtures, weathered chopping boards and rolling pins for a farmhouse kitchen, and collections of glass wine jars and a perpetual calendar. They try to give as much information about each object or collection as possible, with a little cardboard plaque detailing its era and story – as well as possible uses for it in your home – that medicine ball would make a great door stop, for example.
Again, this is down to Leanne’s dedication. She sources all the items personally, travelling to England, France and Belgium twice a year to stock up.
“I can tell you exactly which church in England this came from and when it’s dated to because it’s an original from when that church was built,” she says, pointing to a lovely 1919 oak church pew she picked up on a recent journey.
Most of the store’s contents are on the higher end of an average budget but as Leanne says, “quality never goes out of style.”