Shoreline Trolley Museum

Shoreline Trolley Museum in November

Sarah, Me, Pixie, Barbara, Caroline, Jess K, Jess J, Mel, and Pahl
Photo Credits to Ben Jordan/Photo Images Co.

If you've been reading the blog regularly, you'll know I had originally tried to plan the Shoreline Trolley Museum visit in July 2023.  But...the weather wouldn't cooperate with torrential rain, coastal flooding, and tornado warnings. I figured the second weekend in November ought to bypass all that type of weather. 

The Shoreline Trolley Museum totes itself as the "oldest continually running trolley museum in the United States". This time around, I made sure I planned it right. The director of the museum worked with me to plan the meeting. I told him that I wanted a private charter essentially, but for only 10-12 people, and that we weren't having a party or anything. We just wanted to model our outfits with the trolley station and trolleys as our background. Intrigued, he let me fill out a form and I didn't have to pay for our meeting in advance...all they asked for was that each person who attended donate some money of their choice to the museum that day. After I knew that we didn't have to pay up in advance, I went ahead and also hired a photographer to follow us around all day and take staged photos of us inside the station and various trolleys. I was able to get a very reasonable price and cut the cost with attendees. This was going to be the best meeting I ever planned yet!

The day was cool, crisp and clear. This was the weekend after Daylight Savings Time ended. (For those of you who live in a part of the world where you don't do this, we "fall back" and are forced to turn our clocks back an hour to provide us with slightly more daylight in the morning as opposed to the evening, to I think make it safer for people waiting for transport in the morning time? From November to January, we are lucky to get approximately 9 hours of daylight in my region).  So my thematic suggestions were fall colors, jewel tones, gothic/black, and or pinstripes. I wanted to evoke a historical feeling that worked with the interior of the cars as well as the season of the year. 

Everyone really "nailed the assignment". Sarah is wearing some great jewel tones of her green chocolate rosette dress paired with a bright red coat and shoes. I had a vision that I must wear my Miss Point gothic pinstripe Point Manor OP and accessories that I purchased in 2022 because I knew these colors would work with the inside of the older trolleys especially. Pixie wore an outfit that matched mine quite a bit with the black shirt and yellow topaz skirt, but paired with a beautiful jewel tone blue corset and a purse that was a working clock!! Barbara went for all black, and as she put it, "the look of an orphan looking for a new lease on life". Caroline wore a garnet red dress that had a print of different types of coins on it, which is  cleverly reminiscent of the fare that many operating trolleys still take in various parts of the world today. Jess K stuck to ruby red and white for her main pieces and a blue and white caped coat as an accent (and to stay warm I imagine). Jess J wore a dress with a design called "British Bear", which was sapphire blue plaid with gold accents and different kinds of teddy bears on it. Mel wore a bright red and white dress (which reminds me of a classic Chinese styling with the shape as well as the diagonal fabric buttons on the front). And lastly, Pahl wore his new gray outfit which included a shirt he purchased from Thomas Farthing (which we visited when we were in London), his slacks and tailcoat from the Historical Emporium, as well as a new navy blue puff tie. The herringbone black and grey shoes he apparently had for a long time, but didn't have anything to go with them until this year. (He actually wore this exacty same outfit at the Bakery Meeting, except that he wore a Sherlock Holmes type hat rather than a bowler). 

An posed group photo next to one of the the Trolley barns

Group photo in front of a trolley very similar to the one that we rode on our private charter

Pahl & Danielle close up in the party car

I had a lot of fun learning more about the museum from our private charter conductor as well as Lydia (the events coordinator) who was volunteering that day. I enjoyed moving from trolley to trolley to take wonderful group and close up photos. I highly recommend this museum as a place to work with for your next event. I also highly recommend nearby Transilvania Restaurant, which serves Romanian and American style food (we went here as a group afterwards). The owner is super nice and the restaurant theme is really fun (in a weird and good way) and I've tried several of the Romanian dishes and they are all delicious.