I have been collecting quite a few “woddity” — wonderful oddity — stories lately — including lots of woddity-spotting my readers — so this might evolve to be Woddity Week on Retro Renovation. Above, spotted on ebay: Vintage shelf brackets, in the ubiquitous Knape & Vogt style — but taken a couple of steps further, which golly, seems to be the entire theme of innovative midcentury America. That is: Some designer said, ‘Why settle for just a smooth painted bracket? Let’s introduce a line that is finished in all the popular finishes — coppertone, gold, hammered pewter … and then, let’s die cut the steel with decorative motifs (that had to be no small feat)… and then, let’s add special locking mechanisms to help ensure the brackets don’t slip. Seller stonyrunwildflowerfarm discovered several dozen New Old Stock sets of these Champion by Standard Keil delights and kindly gave me permission to feature photos for our archive. Oh — and you can still buy them, too, they were just listed for sale a few days ago –>
, it nets me a teensy commission.
Vintage shelf bracket styles, for our woddity archive:
Loralei says
I worked in visual merchandising for many years, and without the decorative cutouts, these shelf brackets are still standard in retail. They all have the locking screws too. I don’t know if you can buy them today in decorative finishes or not.
I spent so much time with fixturing that I don’t know if I could have shelving like that in my house. It’s kind of like Christmas decorations…spend years decorating department stores and Christmas lights lose some of their charm.
pam kueber says
Yes, I agree these are still standard. Did not know about locking mechanisms being available today. But yes, my main point is the decorative cutouts — oh, and the finishes, too.