Vintage B. Kliban Collector's Items

Vintage B. Kliban Collector's Items

The artist B. Kliban created Kliban the ultimate cartoon cat in the 1970s and his black and white cat achieved huge popularity from the publication of the first book and was eventually featured on every type of merchandise conceivable from calendars and t-shirts to mugs and cookie jars. (Shown above is the first B. Kliban book called Cat.)

The book The Collectible 70s says that official B. Kliban merchandise, that is merchandise marked BKliban, was only manufactured for about 6 years. Since Kliban the cat has retained his popularity, merchandise bearing his likeness is highly sought after, especially the older pieces marked BKliban. After the artist's death, other manufacturers produced pieces using Kliban's likeness and some of those items will be marked JKliban or BKcats. 

B. Kliban Cat Space Ship Teapot


I love the striking teapot shown above, which was previously sold on eBay by seller lkg0vvu.  However, that one has since been sold. You can, however, check for it and see what other Kliban teapots are available here on eBay. What Kliban collector wouldn't like to own a themed teapot?

B. Kliban Pants Cookie Jar

I rarely find Kliban merchandise myself when I am sourcing but at one point, I did have the fun cookie jar shown above, which was manufactured by Sigma and Tastesetters in the shape of a pair of pants with not one but rather three Kliban the cat figures on top. If you are interested in a Kliban cookie jar, you can check eBay here and you can find oodles of other Kliban merchandise on eBay by clicking right here 

Pretty good, don’t you think, for a cat that is not considered particularly cute or mysterious but simply very funny?

Brenda
Treasures By Brenda


Canadian Pickers Television Show

Canadian Pickers

SPOILER ALERT! This post discusses the places the Canadian Pickers visit and the people they meet on the first episode of Season 4.

I just watched what may be the best-ever episode of the television show Canadian Pickers. The show always resonates with me because it's filmed in Canada and I'm a Canadian and because I have travelled to many of the places that hosts Scott Cozens and Sheldon Smithens visit. However, there was something about this show that made me really, really, really, want to go picking, shopping, thrifting or whatever you call it right NOW...

I love how the show started out in a barber shop in Toronto that celebrates the Toronto Maple Leafs Hockey team in full color, even though hockey is not my favorite sport.

I also enjoyed the second visit in Toronto to the kind of antique store that I would like to shop in, one that's filled to the rafters with stuff including odds and ends and interesting bits and pieces. Both Scott and Sheldon met the challenge of finding a great item for resale purposes at a cost of $50. I am not sure I could have met the challenge but it would have been fun to try.

Next the show took us to visit a couple who built a home of logs. The couple also constructed the garage to look like an old-time service station. How cool is that? I'm not so interested in the stuff that the Canadian Pickers picked here but the location was pretty interesting and I think it would make a good set up for an eBay seller, but I digress…

Next we visited the home of a 16-year-old who both collects for himself and operates a business buying and selling antiques. We enter a suburban home not unlike the one that I live in, and there are no collectible items in sight. It turns out that the young man keeps all of his antiques in his bedroom. If you ever get the chance to see this episode, prepare to be amazed. I think it is really great what this young man has learned and accomplished so far about antiques and about negotiating. In the show footage, he appeared to have no trouble matching wits with the Canadian Pickers.

It was a fabulous episode of an always interesting show. If you haven't tuned into the Canadian Pickers, which I believe is known as the Cash Cowboys in some markets, what are you waiting for? At each pick you will meet some interesting people, learn a great story and uncover some history.

I know from experience that it is not as easy to gather a bunch of great places to “pick” as this show made it look. On a recent vacation, when we had a few hours to shop, we struggled to find some good stops because we had not done any advance planning. We did not come home empty-handed, but we weren't as successful as we could have been.  

We did find some collectible Alexander Keith's products as well as some beautiful handmade baby quilts, which are nothing like what you usually see the Canadian Pickers picking but nevertheless are still quite interesting and will make a beautiful addition to a baby's nursery either as a crip or lap quilt or as a wall hanging. As an added bonus, these purchases will pay for the gas for our Nova Scotia vacation.

How about you? Do you watch any of the shows about antiques, collectibles, auctions, collecting, picking or even just vintage-style? Which ones would you recommend?

EDITED 2019 to note that the Canadian Pickers program finished and the Facebook page wound down around 2014.

Brenda
Treasures By Brenda
You never know what treasures
I might have in store for you!





Disclosure

This post may contain affiliate links, which means we may receive a commission, at no cost to you, if you make a purchase from Amazon, eBay or Etsy through a link.



“As an Amazon Associate, Ebay (EPN) and Etsy (Awin) Affiliate, I earn from purchases. ” Disclosure Statement

X