GREENFIELD — Vintage Days provided a throwback for downtown shoppers over the weekend, celebrating all things vintage with deals and special promotions.
Many downtown businesses got creative with the theme. Main Street Bar & Grille and the Hangar Pub & Grill crafted their own vintage cocktail menus, while the Garden Cinemas screened the 1989 “Batman” movie at a $4 admission fee.
“Any business can participate, they don’t have to be a vintage business,” Greenfield Business Association Director Hannah Rechtschaffen said while giving out information to patrons at the Greenfield Farmers’ Market.
While many businesses made Vintage Days special with new offerings, one doesn’t have to look far in Greenfield to find appreciation of vintage items on a daily basis. There are many stores that line Main Street and beyond selling used goods for people to repurpose and cherish, such as the Webb building’s Innovintage Place on Hope Street.
“This is a collective of local vendors who have some wonderful eyes for vintage items, clothing, furniture and random items that are cool as heck,” said Innovintage Place store clerk Ceridwyn Carlton.
Carlton said Greenfield is a great place to celebrate vintage because of the vast amount of history in Massachusetts. With such expansive collections of vintage items, Carlton said it is a perfect time to pick up something old and keep it as something special to cherish.
Antique shops were not the only places to celebrate vintage items. The Museum of Our Industrial Heritage and the Historical Society of Greenfield also opened their doors to visitors to learn about local history. These lessons included stories of manufacturing plants, dinosaur footprint discoveries and more.
Over on Court Square, visitors showed off their vintage rides with an antique car show. Around the corner at the recently renamed Greenfield Records, which sells vintage records, CDs, books, cassettes and DVDs, co-owner Maria Danielson explained people like to buy a vintage physical object because it reminds them of memories from their past. Greenfield, she added, has become a great place to buy all things vintage.
“I think people who move to western Mass. are not in the rat race trying to have the newest, most expensive things,” Danielson elaborated, noting that her store can find new homes for cherished objects from different generations. “The area self-selects to buy used items.”
“It is cool to have a little piece of history in your home,” Carlton agreed, “especially when you have knowledge about what that thing has seen.”
Bella Levavi can be reached at 413-930-4579 or blevavi@recorder.com.