Incorporating Heirlooms Into Your Home
One of the things I love most about our home is the photos! I want to literally cover the walls with frames (inspo below). Photography is something I’ve long been obsessed with—since the days we developed disposable cameras at Kodak—and displaying family photos is just one way I’m adding character to our home with heirlooms. Some “heirlooms” I’ve acquired by accident, and some I made a conscious effort to collect. Either way, I think the motivation in displaying such items is that we are the product of generations before us and countless family memories, and I want that reflected in our home!
Here are 5 ways I’m incorporating heirlooms into our home:
Photos
This is a no-brainer, but a lot of my friends only have photos of themselves and their S.O. or immediate family on their walls. I’m in the process of creating an "ancestry wall” in our dining room—which sounds stuffy, but it’s really just a designated space to display family photos, like my grandpa’s WWII portrait. I plan to buy this wall shelf (x2) to display the collection. Aside from the ancestry wall, I also plan to frame my favorite photo of my mom (in her apron basting the Thanksgiving turkey) and favorites from my childhood, like my first boat ride and my dad teaching me to ride a bike, still in suspenders from work that day. I just love the idea of displaying candids from over the years—a visual timeline.Albums/Books
My dad had a significant record collection (the Beatles, Joni Mitchell, James Taylor, Stevie Wonder, Simon & Garfunkel, Led Zeppelin … ) that I think he started assembling when he was in high school. He doesn’t use them anymore and they spent the majority of my childhood collecting dust in a basement storage closet. One day my sister and I decided to take home a few, and I love having this little piece of him—and history—in our home. They fit perfectly in the shelf of this side table.Matchbooks
I’ve collected matchbooks over the years from various restaurants—from bachelorette trips to different cities I’ve lived in—and when my grandpa passed away, I got lucky enough to take home a few from two of his former businesses—a café/bar and a car wash. It is so special to me to have these items that represent his livelihood. (I love the slogan on the café/bar book: “Dine and dance in the most beautiful spot in Northern Michigan.”) Not many restaurants make matchbooks anymore, but I always make a point to check the host stand! They’re a little souvenir from where you’ve been, at a moment in time. I’m displaying them in this hurricane.Recipe cards
This is a fun one! I was able to procure my grandma’s Swedish meatball recipe (one of her signature dishes), with her name on it, as well as Chris’s grandma’s homemade ice cream recipe—something she served at every family holiday. I framed them (using Framebridge) and have them displayed in our kitchen! So fun to look at them when I’m cooking dinner during the week.Dinnerware, Serveware, Barware, Vases, Artwork, Decor
I have a couple of 1664 pint glasses from my parents’ former bar on display (I think purchased on a trip to France), and it’s common to have anything from coffee cups to china and crystal passed down through the generations. My older sister has my grandma’s olivewood salad bowls as well as some lowball cocktail glasses we used whenever we were at their lake home in Northern Michigan—they had little blue and red sailboats on them and are so distinct in my mind! Any memento in this category is really special as it’s reminiscent of family meals, gatherings and celebrations. I’m sure one day I’ll inherit one or two of my mom’s Le Creusets and maybe a Waterford pitcher? Hint hint, haha!
Do you have any of these items, not yet on display? Dig ‘em up—these are exactly the things that make a house a home, and I love the feeling of being “surrounded” by family in this way.
