The Curio Collective returns to downtown with Fall Vintage Show

The popular pop-up market that showcases a diverse group of vendors will donate a portion of admission proceeds from the show to the Mi’kmaw Native Friendship Centre

HALIFAXtoday\ Steve Gow

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One of Halifax’s most popular vintage pop-up markets will be returning to downtown this weekend at Rogers Square.

The Curio Collective has organized almost 30 vendors from Nova Scotia (with a pair from New Brunswick) to showcase a wide variety of vintage antiquities, decor, clothing, jewellery and much more under the Grafton Street venue’s covered open-air event space for its Fall Vintage Show.

“It’s always risky to do an outdoor market (but) with our venue, we don’t need to worry as much unless there’s a crazy hurricane or something,” says organizer and vendor Brigid Milway who revived the popular shopping event at Rogers Square already once earlier this summer after a lengthy hiatus due to COVID-19. “The venue itself is really special — it’s outdoors but it has a roof overhead (so) on a pandemic front, it’s a really comfortable shopping experience.”

Milway founded the Curio Collective exhibitions in May 2019, where she gathered a diverse group of vendors with curated collections with a focus particularly on vintage wares. The entrepreneur behind the online vintage store What These Old Things?, Milway’s pop-up markets quickly became a quarterly event that both shoppers and sellers began to look forward to throughout the year.

“It’s just that there’s truly something for everyone from all the different sellers,” adds Milway about the show’s quick-growing popularity. “We try and get as diverse an offering as we can and we really do; we’ve had 20-year-olds selling 1990s graphic tees and streetwear and people in their 70s selling fine china and everything in between, so there’s really something for everyone.”

However, once COVID-19 landed in Nova Scotia in the spring of 2020, the planning and practicalities of putting on a Curio Collective show became impossible. Milway was forced to postpone planned Curio Collective shows for several months until restrictions loosened enough that she could accommodate a large enough outdoor gathering in July.

“The overwhelming feeling from the crowd was that we needed this and that we are so excited to have this back,” adds Milway about the revived Comeback Show. “Everyone was just so delighted to see everything and everyone in person.”

This weekend’s Fall Vintage Show will take place on Oct. 2 between 10 a.m. and 6 p.m., rain or shine. Most of the sellers will be local and the first 25 people in line at the Main Entrance (on Grafton Street at Sackville Street) will be handed $5 in Curio Cash to spend at the Vintage Show.

While there is a $5 admission to get into the grounds of the Curio Collective exhibition, a portion of those proceeds will be donated towards the Mi’kmaw Native Friendship Centre — an organization that Milway insists she has wanted to partner with for a while.

“With the past Curio shows, we’ve typically had a community or charitable element to them,” admits Milway, noting that she met with organizers at the Friendship Centre and became educated about the Gottingen Street organization’s social programs and diverse offerings. “So just knowing all the programming that they do and what they specifically work towards are all things that are important to me so it was a really easy decision.”

She notes that with the Mi’kmaw Native Friendship Centre celebrating a Weekend of Reconciliation on the Harbourfront this weekend, the timing of the gesture may have been slightly serendipitous but the perfect fit nevertheless.

“They actually have events happening at the same time as ours just a few blocks down the street so we thought that it was kind of cool that people could go from one to the other,” adds Milway. “It was a really great coincidence and just made it further feel like a great partnership.”

For more information on the Curio Collective’s Fall Vintage Show, visit its Facebook page.