J'adore... Vintage Pyrex

You may have heard me mention that in the past few months, I've started to collect vintage Pyrex. I resisted it for a long time. The pretty colors and fun designs tried their best to lure me in, but I kept telling myself that I did not need a new collection of anything. Of course, then I found Pinterest (follow me here!) and the rest was history. Now I kick myself when I think of all the lovely pieces I left behind in various thrift shops because I wasn't a collector. *sigh*

The set of four Cinderella bowls in the Gooseberry pattern (top middle of photo, stacked) were my very first purchase. They broke the dam, if you will. I found these before I found Pinterest. I'm a sucker for old things, and pink things. These were in perfect condition and it was only $18 for the whole set at Goodwill. The small round casseroles that you see to the left of the bowls were there too, but I left them behind. I still kick myself for that move.

Even after buying these, I didn't really consider collecting. These were just a pretty one off that I happened to buy because I liked them. They were going to be the only ones I had.

Well, of course, when I Googled them to find out the name of the pattern, I found a bunch of other pink Pyrex out there.

How adorable is this set of striped bowls? I love that the wide stripes are flanked by narrower ones. I think that makes them more visually interesting than if they had used a uniform stripe.

And there are all these pretties. Even though it's the absolute BEST shade of aqua ever, I've never really been a huge fan of the Amish Butterprint. But in the pink I really like it! I wouldn't mind having any of these in my cupboards!

These are the ones I'm really looking for right now. Daisies are my absolute favorite flower, so a combination of pink Pyrex with a daisy design is pretty much meant for me!

So at this point I'm thinking I'll collect vintage Pyrex, but only the pink pieces. Then it will not get out of control! I'm just so smart.

Enter Pinterest, and this photo:

Oh. My. Word. I loved how happy and bright all the colors looked together on that plain white shelf. The way the collector organized the colors just made them look so appealing to me! So, now I'm thinking maybe it wouldn't be so bad to collect it just in general, because it's so pretty and colorful!

I have the blue and the green covered casserole dishes on the bottom right corner of that photo too. :)

I started looking for other photos of vintage Pyrex on Pinterest. There are a lot of them out there! This is another lovely collection that is especially heavy on the pinks and blues.

How could anything that makes a person look this happy be wrong?

I really like her collection of the racks hanging on the wall. These took your Pyrex up a notch by giving them carrying handles or turning them into chafing dishes or chip and dip sets.

This old ad shows a lot of the pieces with their racks. I really love the one with the coffee pot. That brings me to the subject of the ads. I'm pinning those on my Pyrex board as well.

This one shows how versatile the pieces are, going from freezer to oven to table. It also shows one of the casseroles in it's carrying rack.

Here's an ad for the Cinderella bowl sets that gives you ideas of how you could use them. Nowadays companies want you to buy a separate product for each one of those tasks, but back then people looked for ways to get more bang for their buck.

Check out the prices on those ads too, if you can see them. If only those folks had known what these would be worth in the future!

Of course, there are the ones that didn't survive quite as nicely as most of them. According to the blog where I found this photo, this bowl was the victim of too many trips through the dishwasher, and I believe it! Dishwasher detergent doesn't clean like regular soap; rather, it's an enzyme that sort of eats the dirt off your dishes. If there is no dirt to eat, well then, it will just start to eat away at your dishes instead. This is what causes etching on glasses, and why you shouldn't pre-rinse your dishes before you put them in the dishwasher. (Just scrape off the chunks.)

I suppose it goes without saying that you should NEVER put anything with a shiny finish that you want to protect, oh, say like vintage Pyrex, in the dishwasher.

This is just a cute casserole that I saw online today for the first time. I love how retro the kitchen designs on it are. Another I'd be really happy to find! I lurrrrve it.

And then there are these. If you think it's hard to find vintage Pyrex that's in good condition, well then, it's almost impossible to find it in good condition in the box in which it originally came! This collector (on Flickr) has a ton of these pieces, many with the original 99cent price stickers and decorative tags. So flipping cool.