One of my favourite things about thrifting is the accidental discovery. Thrifting is a bit like gambling in that you never know when you’re going to get lucky; that unpredictable positive reinforcement is what makes thrifting so much fun (or, you might say, addictive) to dedicated thrifters like myself. But apart from that, I love that the “prize” is ultimately a subjective one. One person’s trash is another person’s treasure … and, sometimes, it’s treasure you didn’t even know you wanted.

Here’s a personal anecdote about that.

I have been loving large, chunky, architectural jewelry for the last year or so – it accents my current aesthetic nicely. It has proven to be a tricky category of accessories because quality tells. The bigger the scale of the pieces, the more obvious that cheap production becomes. And, of course, handmade stuff is pricey. For example, I have been eyeing Adina Mills pieces after Sherry (Save Spend Splurge) posted about her on Instagram. But the supply is limited, sells out quickly, and costs well upwards of $100USD per piece.

I am not sure if I am ready to make that kind of commitment, so I haven’t pulled the trigger yet.

Meanwhile, a few weeks ago, I found this piece at Value Village.

It had the right vibe and looked well made, which was my cue for a closer look. I always search for signatures or brand tags on jewelry to help me figure out what I’m looking at. This one was signed “Rafael Canada”.

A 30 second Google search confirmed this was a known vintage jewelry label – enough to make me commit to the $7.99 price tag. At home, I began to do more in-depth research. It runs out that Rafael Alfandary – who signed pieces as Rafael Canada – was a well-known Canadian jewelry designer (originally from the former Yugoslavia) in the 70s and 80s. His pieces were worn by Margaret Trudeau, Mohammed Ali, and Prince among other celebrities. I also learned that the style – which I love, and perfectly encapsulates the aesthetic I am going for with jewelry – is called Brutalist. This is important, because I now have an extra keyword to search when looking for similar stuff online.

I quickly fell in love with a bunch of other Rafael pieces and began hunting for them on eBay and Etsy. The bad news is that inventory is fairly limited and prices aren’t thrift-cheap. The good news is that it’s possible to find pieces under $100CAD. To wit:

This was a very popular design (there is a photo floating online of Prince wearing it at an awards show), and I had to have it – I love the scale of it, the “rough” design, the dark teal Murano glass cabochon. It works so well with my current wardobe, both workwise and casual.

I cannot wait to expand my collection, and it’s given me renewed enthusiasm for the thrill of the (thrift) hunt. Stay tuned for more …

… and please share your didn’t-know-I-needed-it-can’t-live-without-it thrift finds in the comments!

Obligatory “I can’t believe it’s already July” introduction … but, honestly, the last few months have been such a daze, I can barely keep track of the days of the week. All I know is that there are 5 weeks left until my vacation (2 whole weeks, woot woot!), and I know that because I counted this morning. I may or may not be counting that every morning.

Another reason why I feel like I’m living Groundhog Day is the weather. One day it’s warm and sunny; another day it’s cold and rainy. It might have been June, or it might have been April all over again. If you ever find yourself wondering “does Adina not know how to dress appropriately for summer?”, the answer is that I do, but I am also living in the land that summer maybe forgot. Sartorially, this is not a great loss to me – hello, I love layers! – but it does make the months blend together, and I do miss the mental state of being associated with summer. Oh well.

On to the clothes:

This is actually a much more cohesive line-up than I was expecting. I think cutting my hair has made me feel re-inspired, somehow. This haircut works better with my overall aesthetic, which makes me appreciate the said aesthetic more. As it happens, thrifting has been very boring/uneventful lately, which means that I have been focusing on my existing pieces and finding ways to make them feel fresh again. Accessories have played a huge part in that, and I am having a lot of fun with them again. I’m currently really into simple outfits with interesting, architectural (dare I say, brutalist) lines and one big statement piece of jewelry. You’ll be seeing more of that in July. I have also been doing a radical closet purge in anticipation of the next Wardrobe Exchange secondhand clothes pop-up market in September. My goal with that is to let go of designer pieces that I love in principle, but which don’t really fit my style. I find that difficult – it’s hard to let go of the mentality of “it’s a quality silk blouse, of course I’ll find some use for it at some point” – but I am getting better at it.

I can’t say that I’ve thought much about Game of Thrones since its finale. What I did do immediately afterwards was order George RR Martin’s Fire & Blood: 300 Years Before a Game of Thrones. Here’s what it’s not: a prequel to the ASOIAF books. To me, it does not read like a novel, at all. The narrative conceit is that it’s a history book about the Targaryen dynasty assembled by an archmaester. In fact, it reads precisely like historical non-fiction … except it’s all about a made-up family in a made-up world.

As a lover of the historical non-fiction genre, this was right up my alley. If that’s not your jam, your mileage may vary. It’s a big honker of a book too – over 700 pages long. The first 50 pages or so had me worried because they are almost a word-for-word repetition of Martin’s The World of Ice & Fire “encyclopedia” history of Westeros, which I already own and read. If you have that book, you will know the broad strokes of the Targaryens’ reign; Fire & Blood adds a ton more detail and colour to the story. What I did not realize until the end was that it actually stops 5 or 6 kings before Aerys the Mad (the last Targaryen king before the ASOIAF timeline kicks in). So now I am wondering if this is going to be a two-parter history. Par for the course for Martin, I guess.

You might expect that this is a book which only GoT fanatics obsessed with Westeros minutiae might truly enjoy. I don’t count myself in that category, but as a history nerd I was totally engrossed by it and loved it. It’s basically a fantasy retelling of European history, focused primarily on the British isles. My favourite part of the reading experience was trying to figure out what real-life counterpart(s) each Targaryen king was based on; in most cases, each character was a mish-mash of several real kings, with events depicted in the book having been inspired by various (predominantly Plantagenet and Tudor) English kings’ lives. That’s my take, anyway. I don’t know if Martin has ever confirmed his sources of inspiration.

After reading Fire & Blood, I was in the mood for more history, so I re-read David Starkey’s Crown & County: The Kings and Queens of England, A History from my library. It’s an enjoyable, easy read though it felt rushed in places – what I basically wanted was a separate biography of each monarch, especially the Plantagenets. For reviewing the highlights, this hit the spot.

Then I decided to do the same with French kings … only to quickly realize that books on French history are much harder to come by than English history. Most royal biographies focus on the Bourbons (Henry IV through Louis XVI) which is all fine and good; right now, it’s medieval history I’m most interested in. There is a shocking lack of recent biographies on the Capetians and the Valois as a whole. I ended up ordering John Julius Norwich’s A History of France, which was broader in scope than I strictly wanted, but a great read as always – JJN is one of my favourite historians. My only complaint is that the book turned out to be much shorter than I was expecting (a relatively slim 400 pages), and a lot of the medieval history was very lightly touched on.

Let me take this chance to make another plug for Maurice Druon’s Accursed Kings series about (the Capetian) Phillip IV and his progeny, another likely source of inspiration for George RR Martin. This book has it all: political scheming, murders, adultery, sorcery, 13th century courtroom intrigue. And it’s (largely) based on real life events, which is fascinating. I basically want to read the non-fiction version of this series, and really delve into all of the details. Someone write this book, please. I am currently re-reading Barbara Tuchman’s A Distant Mirror, which is an excellent resource on the 14th century in Europe (predominantly France and England).

In non-historical fiction news, I also started but have yet to finish Normal People by Sally Rooney. This book came with a lot of hype but, for some reason, I didn’t connect with it enough to keep at it. I didn’t hate what I’ve read so far, but it’s meh. I’ll probably push myself to finish it at some point.

What have you been reading lately?