Check out my latest Craigslist find: An awesome pie safe! I was so excited to be the first person to email the previous owner because these are so hard to find!
I rarely find items for resale on Craigslist because people typically ask for normal resale prices, but occasionally there will be a man who is tired of his wife’s heirloom sitting in his shop/garage and will nag his wife until she allows him to sell it. I’ve noticed the guys will price the pieces at what they value it, which in most cases is much less than the true value. I’m not 100% sure that’s what happened with this piece, but a few months ago I got a huge gorgeous French Provincial china cabinet for $50 for the above reason.
I like to look up what these old antiques were primarily used for way-back-when. Pie safes were introduced by the Germans in the 19th century. They come in all shapes and sizes, typically made of pine or other local wood. Pierced tin or screening was used to provide ventilation and prevent bugs and vermin from getting into baked goods, baking ingredients, etc. Now that we have refrigerators, they’re just really neat to decorate with and store a large amount of stuff in!
I put my pie safe in my antique booth at Jenifer’s Antiques in Conway, AR. This thing has incredible storage space if you can’t tell! It shows its age, but that’s the cool thing about antiques, right?