HomeArchive AboutFun Contact

Pezhead Monthly

December 2020
Thinking Outside The Dispenser
Since 2001

Spring Loaded: A Message from the Editor
Introducing My Pez Room
Pez Poetry

The Pez Almost-Quote of the Month

Spring Loaded: A Message from the Editor | top

Hello and Happy December from Pezhead Monthly! The countdown is on to a new year and I cannot help but feel hopeful for better times ahead. Don't get me wrong, there have been some great things about 2020- and with Christmas on its way, still some more great things to come- but the good times have been fewer and farther between and I think a fresh start will be good for all of us.

In November, my Pez life mainly consisted of putting the final touches on my Pez room, so that it will be ready to show to people in person and online. I finally finished this task, after over a year of planning, arranging, and rearranging, and am quite happy with the result, even if I am already thinking of a few updates for it in the near future. Next came the many, many pictures and a couple of videos, which I will be sharing in this issue and later ones.

My Pez scores this month were a bit of everything. Chief among these are 8 of the 9 Series 2 of the LOL Surprise dispensers and many new fantasy Batman Pez dispensers, which I made myself as part of the Pez room debut and in particular the debut of the Batcave. I also picked up one of the Black Friday POP+Pez dispensers, a Venomized Doctor Doom. Here are two pictures of my other November scores. The second picture includes a couple of simply incredible custom stands I picked up from a talented craftsman named Larry Mason.

This month's cover image features a Pezzified version of the fantastic holiday movie "Elf," just in time for Christmas. There is also a Christmas-themed Pez Almost-Quote (inspired by the classic Christmas movie "Die Hard") and a Pez limerick. But the main feature this month is definitely an introduction to my Pez room. In this issue are multiple pictures of various areas of my Pez room, along with a couple of videos. The pictures in this month's issue are also located on the About Joe's Pez page on this site, which will soon include closer pictures with more details and some more thoughts on the shelf or other item. More details will be coming in the next issues too.

I also encourage you to check out the Pezhead Monthly Christmas page, which has been updated with a few new features from this month's issue.

Here's to a healthy, safe, and joyous holiday season and a Happy New Year ahead.

By the way, did you miss last month's issue, where I recapped my experience at the 2020 IN Crowd Pez Gathering? You can still read it here. To search the full Pezhead Monthly archives, hop on over to the archive page, where you can browse by feature, Pez Poetry Slam, or issue. There's also a Google search bar to help you search the content across the site.

Thanks as always for reading Pezhead Monthly. Take care and see you next month!

Joe
Editor, Pezhead Monthly
joe@pezheadmonthly.com



Introducing My Pez Room | top

A Pez display is a marvelous thing. It is the home base for a Pez collector, where scores from stores, flea markets, conventions, and other places, found in the last month or across many years, are gathered into a single place. It could be a shelf, wall, or curio cabinet. It could be a room, or maybe an entire floor or basement. The size of the Pez display does not matter because anytime a Pez collector chooses to show their love of the hobby is a cause for celebration.

But more than just an assembly line of items on a shelf, a Pez display tells a story or, actually, many stories. It's not just what is on display, but why and how it is being displayed. Yes, that Pez dispenser might be a common one found at Walmart, but it could also be a long-sought after rare vintage dispenser, or a gift from a friend who saw something at a flea market and knew just who it was for. It could be some artwork from one of the many gifted artists in the Pez community. It could be a special area devoted to a certain dispenser or set of dispensers. It could bring back memories of days gone by and of friends made along the way, some of whom may no longer be with us. It could be any of these things or any number of others.

Over the course of my 26 years as a Pez collector, my Pez display has taken many forms. The first one was a small shelf in my college dormitory room. Since then it has been on bookcases, in curio cabinets, in a room shared with my work-at-home area, and on sometimes flimsy plastic shelving that to this day I wonder how it managed to hold up. I've also gone through an extended period where, due to lack of space, most of my Pez collection was in storage.

That all changed in 2019, when my wife and I were in the market for a new house. The one that really caught our eye had a finished basement with a bonus room. The minute I walked into the room I knew that it would be perfect for my Pez display. Over the course of the next many months, I added new flooring and many new pieces of furniture, most of which came from IKEA. There were long hours of furniture being assembled, storage boxes being emptied, and Pez items being added to shelves, all of which was made easier by Pandora Radio and many tasty beverages. There were sore backs and skinned knees. There were Allen wrenches. My God, there were so many Allen wrenches.

But I am here to tell you that it was all worth it! After providing an update in July 2020, I am so very happy and proud to present to you my complete Pez display as of November 2020. This is the first time I have ever had an entire room to display my Pez and I could not be more thrilled about it. Yes, there are still a few pieces of my collection in storage that I am not sure if I will display. And yes, I already have some ideas kicking around in my head for things to be rearranged, added, etc. But I am extremely satisfied with how things came together and at how great it feels just to walk into the room.

Below are some pictures and videos of various areas of my Pez room. You can click on any picture for a larger view.

Let's start with a video that shows how my main Pez display has grown over these last many months. The video wraps up with a 360-degree view that showcases most of the Pez room in its current state.

The below poster greets you as you make your way towards my Pez collection. It is from Pezamania 10 in 2000, which is 1 year before I started attending Pezamania conventions. I had it in storage for a while and finally decided to frame it.

The picture below shows what I consider to be the main part of my Pez display. The 4 bookcases are Billy bookcases from IKEA. These bookcases came with doors to attach in the front, but when I tried to attach them, I could not get the cases to stop from tipping over. This could be fixed by attaching the cases to the wall, but when I set them up, I was not sure of their final location, and in fact I added the fourth bookcase a few months after the first three. The cases seem to be in a permanent location now so I might attach them to the walls (and add glass doors) at some point.

The display shelves inside these cases and on the top left are the grandstands available from Chris Jordan's store, PezCollectorStore.com. They come in two different sizes, with the larger size perfectly fitting on a Billy shelf. Each of the shelves fit 5 rows of Pez, for a total of anywhere from 75-100+ dispensers each. You may note that there are a few empty places for more/larger shelves that I will fill down the road.

The dispensers fit in the grandstand displays nicely, with a "lip" on front to hold the feet of the dispensers to prevent them from tipping over. For Pez dispensers without feet, Chris's store also sells special "shoes" that are designed to fit under these lips and on these displays.

The white display shelf that holds the giants are Mega Expand-A-Shelves, which I picked up from The Container Store but are available in a variety of other places.

This next picture shows 3 more Billy bookcases and a spinning rack, which are immediately to the left of the entrance to the room. The bookcases mainly display my collector sets and the spinning rack displays many of my carded Pez that I can't quite bear to set free.

There is a small corner directly to the right of the entrance to the Pez room, and this next little display fit perfectly. I got the corner table from Amazon, the lamp from Target, and the wire rack from my wife. On the table are a couple of sets of Pez magnets and a flyer from the Pop Supernatural art exhibit, which I visited and wrote about in detail in a recent issue of Pezhead Monthly.

On the white wire rack are postcards, most of which came from a fellow Pezhead named Josef from Austria. I really like the vintage look of these postcards and they are a nice way to greet you when you first come into the room. I got the multicolored clips from Michael's.

This next photo features 4 Detolf display cases from IKEA, as well as another small Billy bookcase to the left. Just out of frame to the right is a fabric bench that also doubles as extra storage.

This part of the room has a lower ceiling and the lighting is not as good as in other parts of the room. I made up for this by adding puck lighting for each of the Detolf shelves, as well as shelf lighting for the top of the shelves and for the Billy bookcase. All of these lights are controlled by remote controls (as are the P, E, and Z letters on the top of the Detolfs!)

Up next is the Fabrikor from IKEA, a display case that contains glass panels all around and is great for its placement in the middle of the room. This case displays some Pez items from my wedding (which I mentioned in a previous issue of Pezhead Monthly), some early printed issues of Pezhead Monthly, and more. There is enough space in the middle of the room for a few more Fabrikors, as I continue to grow my collection.

This area is just to the right of my main Pez loose display. The two bookcases are both smaller Billy Bookcases from IKEA. I got the one on the left first, and then was thrilled to realize that there was just enough space in between that case and the wall for a thinner case. In this picture you'll also see a whiteboard for some of my Pez magnets, a digital photo frame, and a framed poster of the movie "Stand by Me" that features a Pez-related quote from the movie.

And last but certainly not least, here is a look at my Batman wall. Pezheads often have a favorite dispenser or type of dispenser. For me, that is Batman Pez in all of its various forms. On the left of this picture are 3 corkboards that display my Batman cards. On the right is a Pez portrait I picked up from Pezamania a while back, as well as a giant cutout of a Batman Pop Pez. In the middle is a Batman curtain that I got from Fine Art America. (I like the design so much that I also got it on a phone case and a t-shirt!)

So you may be asking, what is behind the curtain? The answer to this question is: The Batcave!

Click the picture below to go to a video that shows the opening of the curtain and offers a glimpse inside. There will definitely be more photos and words about the Batcave in a later issue of Pezhead Monthly.


Pez Poetry | top

Kringle

There once was a Pezhead named Kringle
Who was known for his jolly and jingle.
For good boys and girls
He traveled the world,
And Pez would set him atingle.


Pez Almost-Quote of the Month | top

"Now I have a Pez dispenser. Ho Ho Ho."

You can check out all of Pez Almost-Quotes from Pezhead Monthly on the Random Pez Almost-Quote page.

 

HomeArchive AboutFun Contact

Follow Pezhead Monthly on Facebook | Twitter | E-mail

If you would like to contribute to Pezhead Monthly, click here for the submission policy.


Copyright © 2001-2020 JoePez Publications
"Pezhead Monthly" is in no way affiliated with Pez Candy, Inc.
PEZ is a registered trademark of PEZ Candy Company Inc., Orange, Connecticut.

Enjoy Pez, but please do so responsibly.