A Twistee Treat Photo

Photographer’s Note

On the trip up Highway 55 to Chicago from St. Louis, we have started to make a visit to this antique mall (basically an antique co-op, lots of vendors set up in the same place) a habit. They started out a few years back with just a pink elephant and an old sign, but their menagerie of large scale, eye-catching objects has grown considerably. Now it is hard to see them all in one photograph! Their most recent acquisition was this giant ice cream cone building, labeled TWISTEE TREAT. Ironically, the giant man in the blue swimming trunks has his own ice cream cone in his hand. The proprietors of the mall said they will actually be selling ice cream from this building very soon. It was not open for business yet, however, there was a man working on setting it all up - you can see him trying to avoid my camera lens in the right hand lower corner of the photo.

He kept ducking me, I guess he thought he might mess up my shot, or he is wanted by the FBI. He probably thinks he was out of the picture in this one...

Anyway, this antique mall is located on old Highway 66 near Livingston, Illinois, not real far from St. Louis. It occupies the old grade school, most of the booths are in the gymnasium - there is a lot of stuff, so it takes a good hour or more to browse through all the interesting, vintage and antique things. I shot a panorama of the inside, but it's going to take some work to get right.

You can see a shot of most of the items they display outside, including the Pink Elephant if you click here.

Have a great weekend - Happy Independence Day to all our American members!

serp2000, worldcitizen has marked this note useful

Critiques | Translate

serp2000 (9441) 2009-07-03 8:43

Hi, Reed,
My congrats on The Independence Day!
Interesting note and fine shot! Nice colours and good details!

Warm regards through The Arctic Ocean!
Serghei

worldcitizen (2257) 2009-07-03 13:55

Hello Reed,
You are good at showing the character of the places you visit. I like this kitschy piece of Americana...and I love good ice cream too! :-) Nice, clear presentation here with lots of details. We can see the little elephants on both sides of the building (although not the pink one!). Did you try the ice cream? :-) Happy 4th!!!

feather (49858) 2009-07-03 14:30

I was trying to think of the word I needed and your previous critiquer did it for me - Kitsch! It seems so inappropriatae for a place selling antiques - all these non-antique plastic objects! I can see how the owner was thinking of a 'White elephant' stall and just ran with the idea. I wonder where it will end!!
Excellent funny post! I wonder about the antique connection with an ice-cream shaped ice-cream shop!(unless he's selling antique ice-creams - if so check the sell-by date! ;D)
Kath

phwall (5556) 2009-07-03 17:14

Hi Reed,
My sister is an antique dealer and she has a small space in a co-op in the Blue Mountains just to the west of Sydney. Her space, along with about seventy five other venders is in an old movie theatre. Amazing what people collect and then sell. I keep telling her most of her stuff is trash which to my constant surprise she gets most indignant about.
We're right into big things here in Oz too, have a look at this it'll make your eyes water.

Anyway back to your shot, it's amazing what some folks will fall for in a marketing presentation, can you image the Twistee Treat people's faces when that get the line "you are going to love what we are going to do as your shop front, and it won't cost much either" haha, theres a sucker born every minute.
I like your shot a lot, it's good fun.
Have a good weekend.
Pete