Gracious Living with Brini Maxwell

Brini Maxwell absolutely rocks. She’s a domestic goddess, and a champion thrifter, and one great podcaster. I am a huge fan.

Brini is the creation of actor Ben Sanders, although the Brini Maxwell show is a strictly-in-character affair, so we’ll be referring only to Brini here.

The whole thing began on NYC public access TV back in 1998, when Brini filmed cooking, home-care, and crafting segments in her own apartment. The show built a cult following, and five years later, was picked up by The Style Network. Brini now produces audio podcasts for NPR, and a video podcast using footage from that original cable access show.

Legend has it that Brini was inspired become a doyenne of domesticity by an amazing thrift-store score: a set of midcentury mixing bowls. One of the great joys of watching the Brini Maxwell video podcast, in fact, is peering around the sets, and ogling all the wonderful vintage stuff. Brini herself is always tastefully turned out in garb from the 50’s, 60’s, and 70’s. I wish I were even one-tenth as glamorous as she is.

You can subscribe to Brini’s NPR podcasts, titled “Hints for Gracious Living” here. You can also listen to the latest show. (Unfortunately, NPR doesn’t maintain a website where you can listen to past shows, so you’ll have to subscribe to the feed to get those.) The podcasts are about 5 minutes long, and cover topics like Making Candles, Cleaning Shortcuts, Keeping Warm, Thrifting, Regifting, and more. Always delightful.

Brini’s video podcast can be found here. The videos are hilariously, deadpan funny — and informative.

And by the way, Brini’s website is also loaded with great stuff.