Home & Garden: Flamboyance ambiance
During the doldrums of the pandemic, John Smart was beguiled by a pop of colour coming from the vintage store across the street from his Caroline Street West home in Creemore.
The metal prong legs, the rigid but graceful neck, and the patina of the plastic plumage was too much to resist.
Enamoured, Smart bought all nine vintage flamingo lawn ornaments.
“Everybody was down in the dumps and moping about because of Covid,” recalls Smart. “I thought, I have to do something.”
He installed the flamboyance in front of the house… that was the beginning of a hobby of sorts for Smart and his wife Susan Cook, one encouraged by friends, and family, anyone with an Amazon account.
“People really enjoyed it,” he said. “It got people talking. They love the flamingos.”
We asked, What was the thinking? “It was completely mindless,” replied Smart, while standing in a backyard flamingo habitat populated by ornamental birds of all shapes and sizes.
Smart added mini windmill flamingos to the post in front of the house and began adding full-sized birds to the stand.
The plan was to relegate the flamingos to the yard but they have since nested in the conservatory at the back of the house… and the kitchen.
Smart and Cook started wearing flamingo-themed clothing, readily available due to a serendipitous fashion trend, which now takes up quite a bit of inventory in both their wardrobes.
A fenced portion of the deep lot behind the house and the garage creates an oasis for birds – both living and moulded. The expansive perennial gardens planted with ferns, forget-me-nots, hostas, geraniums, lilies and Hieronymus and divided by stone pathways, are populated with finches, blue jays, cardinals feasting on sunflower seeds.
“My garden ruins me,” admits Smart. “I like sitting in my garden and doing nothing but then you see something,” he said of a weed that needs to be pulled or a tree that needs to be trimmed.
However laborious, the garden is the perfect setting for the annual convention of the Flamingo Society of Creemore, held annually on or near National Pink Flamingo Day, observed around the world on June 23.
As pandemic restrictions lifted, Smart and Cook wanted to open their flock to more humans so they began organizing socials, inviting neighbours and friends. The dress code? Casual Flamingo evening wear, of course.
The Flamingo Society of Creemore, with Smart as its “stable genius” now boasts 39 members, including international members in the U.K.
Early on, Smart adopted a uniform of flamingo shirts. It started when he held the first sale in The Attic, a store above the garage modelled on the bric- à-brac shops in the UK, a place where they vacation annually. At that time, the flamingos were placed in a row down the driveway leading to the sale. The marketing strategy worked as Smart recalls the sale being absolute bedlam.
The house and garage have significant historical significance. Called the Blacksmith House, Smart and his late wife Jean, who was the village’s pharmacist, ran a bed-and-breakfast for many years.
The house was originally the home of some of the village’s blacksmiths.
A newspaper ad from an 1889 edition of The Creemore Advertiser for Carlton’s Blacksmithing and Carriage Works read, “Caroline St. opposite the Presbyterian Church. All orders for Cutter Sleighs, Wagons, Buggies, Phaetons, Harrows, etc. etc. promptly attended to. The Carriage Works are unsurpassed. Blacksmithing in all its branches. Horseshoeing a specialty.”
The building had many uses over the years, including storage for Creemore’s fire trucks and equipment.
On March 5, 1970, the old Blacksmith Shop collapsed. This was due to its age, a high wind and a heavy snowfall. Through the years it had housed a horseshoeing and machinery repair shop. Some of the known proprietors were Willie Gowan, James Blackburn, Bill Flood and Bob MacDonald. At the time of its collapse, this frame building had been used for feed and seed storage by George Nixon under lease from the owner Mrs. Blackburn.
After the Smarts moved into the house in 1984, they had the new garage built as an homage to the old blacksmith shop, emulating its shape as much as possible.
The Attic, located at 7 Caroline St. W., will open the weekend of June 15-16, weather permitting. The cash-only bric-à-brac shop carries, by definition, “miscellaneous objects and ornaments of little value.”
