About Us

The mother-daughter team of Annamarie and Brigid McAlpin served the Chicagoland area from 1982 until Annamarie's passing in 2025. Annamarie helped Brie's Estate Sales with staging homes for sale and with jewelry preparation and pricing. Brigid is the founder and owner of Brie's Estate Sales. The name Brie's is a combination of the first three letters of Brigid's name and the last three letters of Annamarie's name. Annamarie's husband (and Brigid's father) Ray used to call her Rie for short.
 

Annamarie earned a Fashion Merchandising degree from Dominican University, River Forest and completed the Floral Design program at Harper College, Palatine. She worked at Talbots Outlet, Park Ridge for 13 years, responsible for the store's display and merchandising.

Brigid has a Finance degree from Marquette University and an MBA from Keller Graduate School of Management. She worked as an accountant for 2 years and then as a computer programmer for 12 years before leaving the corporate world in 2002 to start her own business. She sold QVC customer returned clothing on eBay full-time for 7 years, operated a retail store for 8 years and has been conducting estate sales full-time since 2010.

Annamarie and Brigid designed and created a number of different products over the years such as hair accessories, hats and jackets. From 1995-2015 they designed vintage glass bead and crystal jewelry under the company name Windy City Jewelry. In 2004 they formed an artist's group, Flower Girls Gifts, to provide local boutiques and galleries with an expanded selection of floral-themed gifts in addition to the jewelry.

In 2006 they decided to combine the concepts of handcrafted and vintage into one store, Brie's Gift Gallery, where they offered the work of an expanded group of artists in addition to vintage home accessories and small furniture pieces placed on consignment by local residents. As Brie's Estate Sales grew, they decided to close the retail store in 2014.

In 2022 Brigid rebranded Brie's Gift Gallery to C'est La Brie's, which means "it's Brie's" in French and is a play on words on the expression c'est la vie, meaning "that's life." C'est La Brie's is an online store and French Market-style pop-up sale location. Brigid conducts pop-up sales in October in Mount Prospect and in February in Scottsdale. Jewelry remains her specialty, with a focus on Native American and Mexican sterling silver pieces, vintage to newer. This business is completely separate from Brie's Estate Sales - Brigid curates her inventory through her private connections, it does NOT come from estate sales.

Brigid has over 40 years of experience in selling items of all sorts. Her ownership of multiple businesses, love of design and corporate work background makes her uniquely qualified to not only present your belongings in the best possible light but to get top dollar for them. The team at Brie's treats your home like our own and our customers like our guests. We go the extra mile to provide excellent customer service so a wonderful experience is had by all.