City Views, Country Dreams

Good morning from New York, just a few days before Christmas.

Even though I had planned on another post about my London visit, the recent days have been filled with New York City centered fun, and so I will just jump ahead and share some local city views.

Let's start with photographs from some neighborhood shops.  The above picture is from a gift/antique shop that always features lots of tree decorations.

The following two pictures are of scenes in a dry cleaner's shop window.  The proprietors of this shop seem to have a large collection of retro toys and doll house accessories that can be combined to create rather amusing retro settings.

These window displays are at child eye level.

A bit further down Amsterdam Avenue is Posies, a lovely flower shop that is always worth a visit during various holiday seasons.

It's a tiny narrow hallway of a shop, filled with beautiful botanical treats.  The talented staff are experts in making up lovely bouquets for special occasions.

These are just a few samples of what I saw in the shop.

What I bought to bring home to add some seasonal color to my little apartment were these red-berried branches.  Peeking out from behind the berries is a large bowl filled with old glass ornaments.  In some past years, I have bought some branches of greenery upon which to hang these baubles.  This year I will stick with the berries.

The past few weeks have sped past, as I kept quite busy baking cookies, knitting gifts, buying other gifts, wrapping and mailing those gifts, going to parties, and painting this year's Christmas tea cup cards.

And so, it was not until a day ago that I found time to walk over to 57th Street to take photographs of some extravagant shop windows.  Following the horror at Berlin's Christmas market, I spotted a massive police presence around a similar Christmas market set up at the Columbus Circle entrance to Central Park.  I did not take any photographs of the massive uniformed police officers holding machine guns.  I was not tempted to visit any of the market stalls, but kept walking towards 57th Street.

Even along that street Police Department barricades appeared alongside festive decorations.  What a sad comment.

The above photograph shows the Fifth Avenue and 57th Street intersection where Tiffany's faces Bulgari.  An obliging yellow taxi obliged me by passing by.  I composed this picture to minimize any view of the home of the President Elect.

Now, I will show you a selection of pictures of the Bergdorf Goodman shop's windows.  Even though it was nearing sunset, I am sorry that reflections add a certain distraction from what I truly wanted you all to see.

The theme of this year's window designs is Extraordinary Destinations.  Each tableau features at least one major designer's fashions plus a collection of fanciful props.

I think that if you click on the photographs to enlarge them, you may be able to discover more of the window's details.

The above little box of a window merely settled for showing off some amazing jewels.

Please forgive me for those reflections.

Some of the fun of seeing these windows is noticing how scale is handled in a playful way.  Some usually small items are greatly enlarged, or perhaps encrusted with sparkles, or given a new color scheme.

I remember that the following window was called The Hitchhiker and featured a very glamorous cowgirl.

Lots of desert plants showed off a galaxy of greens.

Another view.

I think this window was called A Bird's Eye View.  Lots of birds surrounded the mannequin.

Lots of huge insects in this window...not sure how appealing that would be to every viewer.

The next picture shows a window that had an undersea layer.

 Lots to look at.

This very green tableau featured a tropical rain forest.

It took some patience on my part to wait for the other folks viewing the displays to allow me a closer view of my own.

Bergdorf's windows are without question the best in NYC throughout the year, but in December the shop's OTT displays really stop pedestrian traffic.

Another view of A Bird's Eye View.

Each window has an intricate frame.

Back to that rain forest.

I hope that the above photographs give you all a bit of an idea of what one might see this week in New York.  I thank you all for your visits to my blogs throughout the year, and looks forward to reading your comments in the New Year that will soon be arriving.

And now, let me share wish you the image that I painted for this year's Christmas tea cup cards.

As you can see from the above photograph, each one of the cards is painted individually, and so no two cards are quite identical.

It is my pleasure to wish you all a very Happy Christmas!  This wish is sent with lots of love.