What do you want to know about the eponymous Lori Olson, whose Lori Olson Creations is making its fifth vendor appearance?
Describes her Eden Prairie, Minn., business: “I am your basic one-stop shop for junk. A little bit of everything for everyone.”
Favorite Bonanza piece: “A huge wood Donnay tennis racket probably 4 feet long that had been a salesman’s store prop. Everything about it was real. And it was the exact duplicate of their line of rackets in the day, just bigger! The woman who bought it was so excited. Her husband was a tennis fanatic and the racket he learned to play on and played with in college had been a
wooden Donnay racket just like the one I had. She was going to hang it on a wall in their family room surrounded by old pictures and new pictures of her husband and the whole family enjoying tennis. Sigh!”
Bringing this year: A tall metal and wood case that someone built for their workshop but is going to morph into the perfect storage for some scrapbooker or creative type.
Best find ever: “I bought a built-in buffet style cupboard for $3 from the owners of a little old house that was being remodeled. It was missing one end and the back was pretty rough but the matching paned windowed doors on either side with drawers down the middle were all I needed to see and home it came. My handy carpenter husband went to work and replaced the back with old beadboard and fixed the missing end with oak boards, added a little molding to cover the patching, a couple coats of creamy white paint, some gorgeous glass knobs and a star was born! So much so that we re-designed the new built-ins we were in the process of installing in the living room to match the buffet down to the last detail. And the best part is the look on people’s faces when I tell them I paid $3 for that beautiful buffet.”
Best Bonanza moment: Being there during the sale is such a thrill. “The atmosphere is electric and the booths are literally eye candy. I feel so proud just being a part of it all.”
Can’t work without: Sandpaper. The more aged the better.
No one would guess: “I didn’t eat mayonnaise until I was 40 years old. I was sure I wouldn’t like it. Wrong.”
Calling all lovers of mayo, picky eaters and gastronomes here and abroad! Food is served at the Junk Bonanza, though it is the vendors’ goods that provide a feast for the senses!
Kim
