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One Christmas evening, friends set off for dinner at a country inn. As they rounded a bend in the road, they were struck by the image of the old-fashioned village decorated for the holidays. That sparked the idea and, in 1976, Department 56 introduced a series of six hand-painted, lighted ceramic buildings. The rest is history.
What about that name?
Department 56 began as part of Bachman's, a premier retail florist in Minneapolis. The company used a numbering system to identify each of its departments, and 56 was the number assigned to the wholesale gift imports division.
Now part of Lenox Group Inc. and based in Eden Prairie, Minn., Department 56 offers nearly 3,000 giftware, collectible and holiday-decorating products.
Retirements
The end of each year means Department 56 products are retired from production. Once that decision has been made, the mold is broken. That makes the existing pieces more valuable to collectors.
Source: www.department56.com
Linda Kvedoras is a community planner. She decides locations for businesses, churches and schools, determines proper lighting for streets and neighborhoods and even defines the sidewalk paths.
She's not a city employee or even an engineer.
No, she works only on an itty-bitty scale. She develops her communities — quaint, old-fashioned villages, actually — with her Department 56 collectibles.
From atop the staircase leading to her family room, Kvedoras has a view of her annual creation.
“It just takes you,” said Kvedoras, who's worked for nearly 21 years as a medical assistant at the Nebraska Spine Center. “No matter how many times I've set it up, every time I love it.”
While many people decorate their homes for the holidays, the process happens on a grander scale for Kvedoras — and perhaps hundreds of other Department 56 collectors. An entire room of Kvedoras' Papillion house is emptied so villages of homes, businesses and churches — ceramic pieces all decked out for old-fashioned holidays — can be set up.
Department 56 began selling items more than 30 years ago. Numerous village displays now make up the Department 56 line, including the Original Snow Village, North Pole, Dickens and Christmas in the City.
The company's Web site lists about a dozen stores in the Omaha area that carry the products, including downtown Omaha's Tannenbaum Christmas Shop.
Each piece has its own theme, said Jeff Jorgensen, co-owner of Tannenbaum, and pieces often remind collectors of special memories. Many enthusiasts, he said, have a yearly tradition of selecting a new piece to add to their collections.
“The ability to set up your own town and make it go and look the way you want is appealing to many,” Jorgensen said.
That appeal includes the River City Chapter of Village 56'ers, a collectors club of about 30 members in the Omaha area that meets about five times a year to talk about pieces and share display ideas.
In early December, members are invited to tour other members' homes to look at their displays.
They also help one another sell or find retired pieces, said Janet Wilke, a club member who started collecting various Department 56 items about 15 years ago.
“It's fun to collect, and it's really fun at Christmastime,” Wilke said.
Kvedoras, who is not a member of the Village 56'ers, takes about 70 hours to complete the display in her home.
With help from her family, which includes three adult daughters and four grandchildren, Kvedoras removes an entertainment center, a sofa, two chairs, a coffee table, shelves, a computer desk and other furniture from the family room.
Then eight banquet tables of various sizes are moved in to hold the tiny town she creates, which, after 18 years of collecting, includes about 65 buildings and hundreds of accessories.
“It's kind of like playing with dolls,” Kvedoras said. “When you are a little girl you have your doll and your baby buggy and your little kitchen set and all that kind of stuff. This is sort of like that, only a grown-up version of it.”
Her town — with illuminated neighborhoods, streets, a business district and a rural setting — also reminds the baby boomer of her youth in Aurora, Ill.
“I grew up in the '50s,” said Kvedoras, who will turn 61 next Saturday, “and much of this looks like what I remember from my childhood.”
For the past several Decembers, Kvedoras has held an open house for family and friends. It's a chance for her to show off her work.
She's often teased about one day collecting herself right out of her living room space.
She's not worried.
“There is a lot of room yet,” she said. “Really there is.”
Contact the writer:
444-3198, chip.olsen@owh.com
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