@veganchorizo, @syd.vicious123, @peshio.pistachio, @laslibrasvintage
- A vintage pink mirror shaped like an ear is making its way across NYC stoops – and Instagram.
- Two New Yorkers found the mirror on the same day, and then many more shared their history with it.
- The mirror is believed to be from Italy and manufactured between the 1970s and 1990s.
- Visit Insider's homepage for more stories.
A pink, ear-shaped mirror that's popping up on stoops around New York City has become a social-media phenomenon.
On Monday, the mirror appeared on the popular Instagram account @stoopingnyc, which posts pictures of furniture and other items left on New Yorkers' stoops. Run by an anonymous couple, the account has 169,000 Instagram followers.
Since @stoopingnyc shared photos of the mirror to its story and grid, current and previous owners of the item have posted their own images of it. But the origin of the mirror remains a mystery.
Instagrammer Sophie Kendall (@peshio.pistachio) picked up the mirror, which matches her pink apartment, in Manhattan's Chelsea neighborhood on Monday.
"I had to bring it home because I take daily mirror pictures of my outfits," the 19-year-old fashion design student told Insider. "I thought it would be fun to take outfit pictures in!"
peshio.pistachio/instagram
That same day, Lindsay Vrckovnik (@linmick on Instagram) said she found the same mirror on a stoop in Brooklyn's Bushwick neighborhood. Later, @stoopingnyc shared a post about the twin mirrors.
After the mirrors found new homes, the couple behind @stoopingnyc told Insider that the account received several messages from people who said they also owned the mirror either in the past or present. Many of them claimed they found the item on stoops around the city, they said.
"It seems like this crazy ear vintage mirror has been an NYC stoop sensation for like 50-plus years," the account owners said. "It clearly stood the test of time."
It's not the first time the couple behind @stoopingnyc has seen the same unconventional piece multiple times, they said.
"There are a few weird but cool items that always seem to make their way back to stooping," they said, citing a chair shaped like a stiletto shoe. "But this was different because we had never seen it before and then two people stooped it the same day."
Instagrammer Sydney Guerrero (@syd.vicious123) told Insider that her parents had the mirror when she was a kid in the early 1990s, and that it was part of a matching bedroom set.
Her parents purchased the set in New York City before passing it down to Guerrero, she said. Unfortunately, she said, she doesn't know exactly where her parents purchased it from. Guerrero said her parents got rid of the mirror in 2005 when she was 14 and living abroad.
"If I had to guess, they probably gave it away," she said.
@syd.vicious123
Another Instagrammer, B. Cortez (@veganchorizo) said her roommate found the mirror on a stoop in Bushwick in 2018 and that they had it in their apartment for over a year. Cortez has since moved out of the apartment and doesn't know if it's still there.
"Judging from the built-in lights, we assumed that it was from some sort of salon or business that shuttered, which may also explain why there are so many floating around the neighborhood," Cortez told Insider. "But seeing all of these pictures on the stooping account of the mirror in people's family homes, I wonder if it was just some sort of '80s home trend with good marketing."
@veganchorizo/Instagram
Representatives for Las Vibras Vintage (@lasvebrasvintage), a vintage furniture seller in Washington Heights that delivers around New York City, told Insider that it has found and sold several of these pieces over the years, but that none have been marked by the manufacturer. All the mirrors had labels that said they were made in Italy, they said.
"From the interactions that we've had with original owners, a lot of them say that it was just out of a catalog that they were able to purchase the set from any local furniture store that imported goods from Italy in the late '70s all the way through the mid '90s," they said.
If you own this mirror or have any information about the origins of this piece, please contact this reporter at [email protected] or message her on Instagram.