Walking into Casey Fritz’s 1925 Tudor-style home in North Minneapolis, you immediately feel enveloped in a sense of warmth and wonder. You can smell and hear the fire crackling in the fireplace. As you get closer, you can feel it too. Then you start to notice the glowing Christmas lights, and the fresh green boughs draped on the vintage chinoiserie, the stairway railing, and above the fireplace mantle. A vintage aluminum tree sits on a console table in the dining room, decked out in vintage ornaments.
The cozy vibes are off the charts in Casey’s living room.
Casey has placed his vintage aluminum tree in a planter, atop a console table in the dining room.
In the living room, a Christmas tree is laden with vintage tinsel, ornaments, and more Christmas lights. The vintage tinsel dates back to the 1940s and was inherited from Casey’s grandmother. The tinsel is made of a mix of lead and foil, which is why it feels heavy when you pick it up. It’s also why Casey can use it year after year. Anyone who has used modern tinsel knows it’s hard to get more than a few uses before it starts to look wrinkled and sad. Some of the tree’s vintage ornaments were also passed down from his grandmother.
It’s a maximalist tree for sure, and it’s no wonder, when asked to describe his style, Casey says, “Maximalist for life.”
A closeup of some of the vintage ornaments and tinsel.
His style is inspired by small Paris apartments
As a maximalist, Casey’s interior design style has layers upon layers. And yet, it’s collected into neat vignettes, which are well thought-out and curated. When he describes his design inspiration, it all makes sense.
“I’m inspired by little Paris apartments piled high with things,” says Casey. “I like an eclectic mix, and tiny spaces that are impactful.”
His mix is eclectic and masterful. Busts, statues, and vintage taxidermy abound on stacks of books, resting on the floor, and in the case of the taxidermy deer, hanging above the mantle. For the holidays, Casey has draped many of them in hot pink velvet bows.
Casey recommends you buy used, save the planet, and get amazing stuff
Casey’s home is filled with vintage treasures, and most were sourced from thrift stores, estate sales, and antique stores. He bought his first piece of antique furniture—a jelly cupboard—at age 16.
He started selling vintage in 1996. Online, he sells through his Instagram handle @bleuboyvintage, and in real life, he sells at pop-up markets around the Twin Cities, like the Dayton’s Holiday Market Downtown and the Twin Cities True Vintage Show. The Bleu Boy Vintage brand sells home décor, furniture, and vintage clothing, particularly high-end modern labels.
Casey has also gotten into repairing vintage clothing, some dating back to the mid-19th century. He considers himself a fashion conservationist and likes to keep things out of the landfill.
“The world already has enough stuff,” says Casey. “I can find anything anyone could ever want, but used and cheaper.”
The proof is on display throughout his home. Casey bought the ornate, vintage chinoiserie in the dining room at an estate sale. It still had the original price tag on it—$17,000. Casey paid $100.
Perhaps Casey’s best bargain find was this vintage chinoiserie.
In the living room, he uses a Maitland-Smith trunk as a coffee table. He found the trunk on Facebook Marketplace. Maitland-Smith is known for “creating exquisite and unique decorative accessories, lighting, elegant mirrors and accent furniture by employ[ing] time-honored techniques developed before the machine age.” Here’s a similar Maitland-Smith trunk listed for $2,895 on Chairish. Again, Casey paid $100.
On top of the trunk rests perhaps the biggest candle I’ve ever seen. It’s a 5-wick Voluspa candle in Crushed Candy Cane. If you know candles, you know Voluspa is a luxury candle brand, and at this size, it must have cost Casey several hundred dollars. Not so, says Casey, he found it at a thrift store for $15.99.
He had to undo some of the “upgrades”
When you walk in the front door, there is a foyer with a dining room to the right that connects to the kitchen. Across from the front door is a set of stairs that go to the second floor. To your left is Casey’s massive living room. While the house has great original features, the former owners made “upgrades,” which stripped some original character.
Another cozy corner in Casey’s living room.
“There was some late 2000s flipping with a lot of chrome light fixtures from Menards,” says Casey, shuddering. The former owners had also changed the shape of the original fireplace and installed slate tile.
Casey bought the house in 2018, but before buying, he rented it. When the owner put it on the market, he was asking too much. Casey ended up buying a house on the next street over and four houses down. However, three years later, the house was on the market again, and Casey was ready to buy.
“I liked the house so much because of all the charm it still had. I love this large living room with all the windows. It’s a great house to entertain in,” says Casey. He likes to throw a big holiday party and birthday celebration in December.
Casey removed the slate tile and revealed the original shape of the fireplace. He replaced it with 3D ceramic wall tiles in diamond pearl from The Tile Shop and a vintage Art Deco tile from Wells Antique Tile and Pottery in Los Angeles.
Casey added the 3D tiles and the Art Deco tile in the center of the fireplace.
“I picked the 3D tiles because they’re dimensional, and the tiles reflect light from the fireplace when you’re sitting here,” says Casey.
He also added a Gucci tiger print wallpaper to the fireplace niches. While the wallpaper isn’t true to the original style of the house, it’s certainly true to Casey’s personal style.
Casey found the Gucci tiger print wallpaper on eBay.
“I was visiting the drag queen Detox in Chicago, and she had the wallpaper in gold in her bathroom. I immediately looked online and found a roll of the pink on eBay for $120, instead of the $600 retail,” says Casey. In addition to selling vintage, Casey also works as a drag queen under the drag name, Malibu Casey.
Casey replaced all the chrome lights with vintage fixtures. He also had the kitchen cabinets professionally painted Tea Kettle Black by Ralph Lauren and had Gondola by Cole & Son wallpaper installed.
Then, of course, there were some not-as-fun updates, like repairing the chimney and replacing some exterior limestone that was deteriorating by the front door.
Create cohesion with repeating patterns, colors, and objects
As you might expect, there’s a lot to see in Casey’s house. Another way he adds balance is by repeating patterns, colors, and objects. The front door is painted the same pink as the living room breakfront china cabinet, the fireplace niches, and the window seat. The paint is Cross Stitch by Knuckles Paint London. The dining room is painted a softer pink, Lullaby, by Knuckles Paint London.
The front door is painted the same pink as the breakfront china cabinet in the living room, Cross Stitch by Knuckles Paint London.
Shades of pink and green repeat throughout his house. The living room’s walls are painted Dean Green by Knuckles Paint London. You see shades of green in the artwork, like a painting of a face and an abstract landscape, and in objects throughout, like a jadeite cake stand.
There’s also green in the malachite curtains hanging in the dining room. And the malachite pattern itself is repeated, like on the paper on the back of the chinoiserie. A letter opener, tray, and several necklaces are made of actual malachite.
A few pieces of Casey’s malachite collection.
“I’ve always liked malachite. This lady on Marketplace had this whole collection of malachite from her brother, who clearly was this old queen that had really great things,” says Casey, laughing. “I missed out on the Napoleon bust, but I got another marble bust that came from him.”
The ribbons add a whimsical, colorful touch to the deer head.
He also has a collection of vintage ribbons, like the kind you get from winning a race or a baking contest. A collection of ribbons hangs under the deer head above the fireplace; another set is clustered around the edge of the vase.
A collection of ribbons around a vase filled with pinecones.
Pieces of coral and shells pop up again and again. Coral is stacked on the dining room console, some pieces are inside the chinoiserie, and there’s a collection of large, open clam shells on the top of the cabinet, as well.
Some coral is even embedded in a pedestal and sculpture in the corner of the dining room. The striking art piece is from France and is a “pique assiette” which “is a style of mosaic that incorporates ceramic shards, broken dishes and other found objects into a design.” Pique assiette differs from traditional mosaic because it “tends to use nonuniform pieces.” Casey purchased the pieces at Clarabel Vintage in Edina. The owner found the pique assiette pieces at an estate sale, and the couple had brought them back from Paris. The set are some Casey’s favorite pieces.
A collection of busts and Casey’s pique assiette pedestal and sculpture in the dining room.
A few of Casey’s favorite local shops
While some of his finds are from glamorous locales like Paris, much of his collection was found by scouring local thrift and consignment stores. Some of his favorite places to shop locally are Arc’s Value Village, Missouri Mouse Antiques in St. Paul, Amoré Antiques in Anoka, and, of course, Facebook Marketplace.
He also likes H & B Gallery in the Uptown neighborhood of Minneapolis. It’s where his painting with the roses and the fish with teeth is from.
“It’s antiques, but it’s also consignment. So, people drop all their nice stuff off, and the prices are great,” says Casey.
Behind the Shade MN 
Leave a comment