Vintage Graphics Blog

You are here: Home

Easter Clip Art

Easter Clip Art on VintageImagesToGo.com

If you’re looking for Easter clip art for your next project, to make a holiday card, to illustrate a blog post, or whathaveyou you’ll want to check out the store. We’ve added a bunch of absolutely wonderful illustrations for Easter, most dating from the late 1800s to the early 1900s.

Easter clip art images are probably my favorite of the holidays. I happen to have a weakness for animals in clothes and a real appreciation of paws. The rabbits featured on these clipart images are truly scrumptious. And when they’re dressed up you just want to squeeze some of them – they’re just so cute!

I spent a lot of time scanning and cleaning up the images for the Easter section of our clip art site. After working with image after image I realized that turn-of-the-century (the last one – not the recent one!) Easter clip art, of the non-religious sort, had some common themes and motifs.

Easter Clip Art Themes and Motifs

Rabbits
Chicks and Chickens
Pussywillows
Easter Eggs
Easter Bonnets
Fantasy
Flowers – tulips, roses, violets and often a blue flower I can’t identify

The fantasy aspect is perhaps what I find most appealing – the aforementioned rabbits in clothes, the many uses of an Easter egg – egg as house, egg as plane or chariot, eggs that hatch humans – little girls or lovely women, etc

What Can You Do With Our Easter Clip Art?

School projects
Website or blog illustrations
Greeting cards in print or online
Create products to sell on etsy, Zazzle, Cafe Press, etc.
Scrapbooking
Decoupage
Book, paper or ebook, illustrations
Anything you can imagine….

Here’s a slideshow of some of our Easter Clip Art – just some of the vertical images. We’ll be adding more to the shop so do keep checking back.

Artist Catherine Klein

· Leave a Comment

Detail from a vintage watercolor by Catharina Klein

I’ll be adding some more recently acquired vintage images by artist Catherine Klein to the shop.

Who is Catherine Klein?

For starters – let’s get her name straight. Klein’s images were typically signed “C. Klein.” Her name was actually Catharina Klein, but was anglicized by publishers during World War I to Catherine Klein as she is most commonly known today.

Klein was born in 1861 in East Prussia. She moved to Berlin where she studied and later taught art. She was a prolific artist with more than 2000 works that were reproduced on postcards and in calendars and books.

Catharina Klein painted in watercolor. Her beautiful still lifes, botanical images, bird paintings, and images of all sorts of flowers, particularly roses, remain very popular with collectors to this day.

Catharina Klein died in 1929.

Fashionable Men

· Leave a Comment

Snapshot preview from our retro men's fashion catalogs

Yesterday some much anticipated catalogs arrived in the mail. Three fabulous men’s fashion catalogs from the late 1940s – early 1950s.

It’s been tough finding quality images of men. Vintage postcards tended toward the comic or caricature. Beautiful women abound but handsome or fashionable men? Not too many.

The fashion catalogs are filled with images of debonair gents in the office, dressed for sport, or in formal wear. It’s amazing to look through the pages and see how often a cigarette or pipe was a fashion accessory for the sophisticated gentleman. How times have changed!

These elegant retro fashion images will be available soon. For more vintage graphics click on the SHOP FOR VINTAGE IMAGES button in the menu above.

Vintage Images To Go is Live

· Leave a Comment

Our Vintage Images Store Is Open!

It’s been a long time coming – three months of late nights – but Vintage Images To Go is finally live.

We debuted Tuesday evening. I think the site looks great – I had some expert help at the end for which I’m very grateful.

There are still some kinks to work out but I’m very happy overall. The oddest thing is that the site only displays 14 images per page – the 15th is missing. I’m starting to think that 15th image on every page is invisible – and therefore unbuyable - a real problem - but I’ve not yet pinned that down.

Once we’ve got our sea legs we’re going to be offering some amazing membership deals for our early adopters so be sure to check back.

We’re adding fabulous vintage images all the time so there’ll always be something new to see when you drop in.

Raggedy Ann and Andy Books

· Leave a Comment

We'll be adding vintage illustrations from the Raggedy Ann and Andy books to the store

My ephemera collection is growing faster than I can scan. One recent addition to the pile that I’m looking forward to adding to VintageImagesToGo.com are illustrations from two Raggedy Ann and Andy books that just arrived in the mail.

The vintage illustrations in the Children’s Books section of the store are some of my favorites. Johnny Gruelle’s Raggedy Ann and Raggedy Andy pictures from these books will be an excellent addition to the category.

These books were published in 1918 and 1920 and have beautiful, colorful graphics sure to delight fans of these classic children’s stories.

Check the Licensing Agreements

· Leave a Comment

Be sure to read the fine print in the licensing agreement when you're looking for vintage graphics

When you’re on a hunt for just the right image you’ll want to be sure to check the licensing agreements.

Nowadays, with so much content – graphics, books, posts, and more and more available online it’s easy for some people to think it’s all there for the taking.

But it’s not of course. Any contemporary work is covered by copyright. A copyright notice is not required nowadays in the US though that was not always the case.

But what about “free” images? Many sites offer free images to download. But before you think you’re all set and you’ve scored the perfect image for your project you’ll want to read the fine print. Oftentimes, the image can’t be used for commercial purposes for example. And that covers a lot of ground – if your website is for your business you’re out of luck. Or perhaps you were hoping to make a product to sell using the image. It’s quite possible that won’t be allowed or only limited numbers may be created.

And how about images you purchase? You would think that if you’ve bought it, it’s yours. But that’s usually not the case either. Carefully read the licensing agreement and / or the terms of use before you buy an image. The stock images site typically have very long and detailed agreements that detail what you can and can’t do with an image you purchase. Some uses will be allowed, others won’t. Size restrictions, numbers of copies, and more are spelled out in the fine print.

I’ve been buying images for my websites for years and haven’t paid much attention recently to the agreements on the sites I use. But when I wanted an image for part of a blog design I took the time to read the licensing agreement again. I was paying good money for the image so it really hadn’t occurred to me that my use of the image would be constrained. But sure enough it was – in a variety of ways. So I’ll be sure to be reading those agreements the next time I want to purchase an image.

Our terms for use of the images on VintageImagesToGo.com are very generous. The graphics we have on the site come from our personal collection of vintage paper ephemera, collected over many years. The original graphics are in the public domain. We’ve scanned the images, meticulously and laboriously cleaned them up, and often altered them in a variety of ways. You can purchase and use our images as logos, as design elements on your website, on business cards, in calendars, in books, in craft projects, in products created for resale such as postcards, t-shirts, mugs, magnets, etc on sites like cafe press, ebay, easy or dazzle, and in a myriad of other ways. The only limitation on use is that you don’t offer the images as-is for sale or to give away. If you’re using the image online we’d love a link back to the site but that’s not required. So have at it! The price and terms are hard to beat.

Raphael Tuck

· Leave a Comment

Vintage image from a Raphael Tuck Modern Maiden postcard

Any lover or collector of vintage graphics will recognize the name Raphael Tuck. The English businessman, German born, founded one of the world’s most successful graphics businesses.

Raphael Tuck’s was a family business. He and his wife Ernestine opened a small picture and framing shop in London in 1866. He soon began publishing and the company grew rapidly, becoming one of the most successful graphics arts businesses of the time. Three of their four sons eventually joined them in business and their enterprise was renamed Raphael Tuck and Sons.

Tuck rode the wave of improvements in printing and graphics. The company was well known for its beautiful and increasingly popular Christmas cards and after Raphael Tuck’s death in 1900, his sons continued to expand the business, publishing 1000s of postcards as the postcard craze took off around the world. Tuck also published books, calendars and toys. Today, collectors of vintage graphics prize any item with the Raphael Tuck name attached.

We’re always excited to add Raphael Tuck items to our collection and to the site. The lovely image above is from Tuck’s Modern Maiden’s postcard series and can be found on the VintageImagesToGo site for downloading.

We’re Almost There!

· Leave a Comment

Vintage Images Fill My Mailbox

The Vintage Images To Go store is almost ready to launch. Phew! We’ve been working late and long – little sleep and lots and lots of scanning and tweaking of the website. Just a few more tweaks – possibly by someone other than me since the website customization is way beyond my pay grade – and we’ll be ready to go.

We’ve added a STORE (or is it SHOP? – I can’t see it while I’m writing this and my short term memory being what it is… well, you get the picture) button to the menu above. For now it links to the landing page for VintageImagesToGo. The store is still hidden but very very soon that link will connect you to our shop and a marvelous (they may laugh at Romney for using that word but I still use it myself. I’m full of anachronisms and old sayings and word choices passed down from my forbears. I actually find Romney’s word choices slightly endearing. But “sauce for the gander”? Yowza! That was a new oldie for me.) ok – back to my sentence – you’ll be linked to a *marvelous* collection of vintage images. I have to say I’m really psyched about how the store is shaping up. I can’t wait for you to see it.

It’s been a long day and a long night and this is definitely the most digressive post I’ve ever written. Indulge me with one more…

We’ve been buying loads of vintage images to build out the categories on VITGO. The packages get delivered to my office and it’s a highlight of my day to look for the stack of envelopes. A few times I’ve taken photos of the day’s mail like the photograph above to post here or on Facebook.

Several days ago I was paged to the front of the office. I wasn’t expecting a client to come in so wondered who it could be. It turned out to be a woman delivering my camera to the office. I had lost it weeks ago though was still holding out hope it was buried somewhere in the chaos of my house or under the seat in my car. But I guess I dropped it out of the car one day. The woman who found it went through my photos, found one of the pile of packages, and was able to make out my office’s address. How great is that? I was thrilled and so grateful that she made the effort.

Would that someone would do the same if I lose my phone – there are plenty of photos of packages on the phone too.

How to Package and Ship Vintage Paper

· Leave a Comment

Basic tools to ship vintage paper safely

Shipping vintage paper safely is simple with a few supplies

We’ve been doing a lot of buying on ebay as we fill out our categories on Vintage Images To Go. I have to say I am boggled at how poorly many ebay sellers package and ship vintage paper.

Years ago when ebay was first launched, I sold antiques and collectibles full time for a year on the site. That’s a whole lotta packing and shipping. And I was selling breakables – of all sorts and sizes – as well as vintage paper items.

I was a *very* careful packer. It was no easy task and fairly stressful. By the time I stopped, I would almost hyperventilate at the sight of packing materials. And packing materials were everywhere since I was apt to use any cardboard or styrofoam that could be found. My friend and I would make midnight raids to the recycling center at her employer and soon my stash of packing materials filled any extra space in my house.

Nowadays, with the machines the post office use that often mutilate the mail, it’s even more important as an ebay or etsy seller to carefully package your vintage paper and other sale items. Here are the basics that will help ensure the vintage paper arrives in the same condition that it was in when you sold it.

How to Package and Ship Vintage Paper

A plastic sleeve or bag is essential. It may be raining when the package is delivered. Wet paper can mean a total loss.
You can’t use too much stiff cardboard. If you don’t want to spend money for the excellent cardboard mailers from companies like ULine, then you’ll need to find stiff and /or thick cardboard to make a sandwich around the vintage paper items.
Invest in a Do Not Bend stamp and ink pad from an office supplies store and stamp your envelope on both sides.
Do not steal packing materials.

That last item on the list is a huge pet peeve of mine. It’s a happy – and unusual – day when I finish opening my ebay shipments and realize that there are no thieves among the sellers that day. PRIORITY MAIL MATERIALS ARE ONLY FOR SHIPPING BY PRIORITY MAIL. They are NOT to be cut up and used for packing materials. I’m totally disgusted by it. How on earth have we ended up as a country that bleats about paying taxes, starves the Postal System for cripes sake, and then cavalierly steals from the USPS and essentially from all of us. Since stealing is *rampant* among ebay sellers I really think it’s time for the USPS to start charging a refundable deposit on its Priority Mail envelopes and packaging materials.

OK – off my soapbox.

A happy customer is a repeat customer. So package and ship that vintage paper carefully – and I’ll be back for more – lots more!

Abercrombie and Fitch Catalog from 1910

· Leave a Comment

This battered Abercrombie and Fitch catalog is filled with vintage sport and recreation graphics

When you think of Abercrombie & Fitch what comes to mind?

Camping? Fishing?

Probably not. Nowadays when you think about Abercrombie & Fitch it’s all about clothes, sex, and young people. Advertising that pushes people’s buttons.

But, 100 years ago Abercrombie and Fitch was a high end purveyor of outdoor equipment for the well-to-do sportsman and sportswoman. More J. Peterman than A & F. The New York-based original Abercrombie and Fitch filed for bankruptcy in 1976 and today’s company shares only the name.

One of my favorite recent acquistitions is a 1910 Abercrombie and Fitch catalog. It may not look like much from the cover that you see here but it’s chockablock full of wonderful vintage graphics in color that we’ll be adding to Vintage Images To Go. Women decked out as hunters, as rock climbers, as skiers. Men with rifles, with fishing gear, or outfitted to go for a drive – automobile driving was clearly more of a sport – a rigorous one – in 1910. Amazing images that I can’t wait to add to the store.

There are also plenty of black and white vintage graphics that will eventually be added to the website: fishing rods, guns, knives, tents, goggles for our Steampunk section, canoes, sailboats, etc., etc. - if you were outdoors in 1910 you can find what you need in the pages of this catalog. Watch for lots of vintage images in our Sports and Recreation category.

You can find the vintage graphics on VITGO – here we get a chance to share some of the tidbits in the text.

The Abercrombie and Fitch catalog tells of the varieties of camping experiences circa 1910:

“The PERMANENT CAMP may be as simple or as elaborate as the campers wish. Whole families often live in the open in perfect comfort, large parties including ladies and children being easily accommodated with all the little accessories to comfort and individual taste to which they are accustomed…

Invading the wilderness by PACK-HORSE is a method employed by thousands yearly. Practically the entire continent is open to this form of adventure… Our pack-horse outfits are famous among Forest Travelers…

FOREST CRUSING [aka backpacking]. He who adventures into the big timber must look well to his choice of an outfit. Tent, food, sleeping bag, cooking outfit, axe and camp conveniences must be carried on his back and as an added weight comes the gun of his choice with ammunition…

AUTOMOBILE CAMPING is the very newest out-of-door sport. We catalog automobile tents, sleeping bags, cooking outfits, food outfits, in a word, complete automobile camping outfits which will enable the owner of a touring car to take a party for a trip completely across the continent without being dependent on hotels or even stores…

The Abercrombie and Fitch of a century ago marketed itself to those who “consider life too glorious a thing to shackle it by the twelve month to the prison routine of civilized monotony, and at the first opportunity, make for the open where one can live and know he lives with every breath, carrying with him his shelter, his food, his every necessity of living and for a time be independent of all the world beside.” To seek the wilderness – but to take civilization’s comforts with you.

Vintage Images To Go will be up and running soon. Keep checking back as we continue to add vintage goodies from the A & F of yore – and much more – to the site.