Second Hand, Second Thoughts

Many bricks and mortar antique dealers have claimed that eBay has killed the quaint little antique store.     "Nothing's rare anymore," one laments. "People just type in what they want, they find it, they buy it."          Isn't that a good thing?      I mean, the thrill of the hunt, aside, wouldn't it be a good thing to have a choice about having to lurk around in your leaky building in a blighted neighborhood waiting for that one twisted soul who collects Precious Moments Santa Claus /John Deere figurines to stagger in and find yours that you squirreled away between the Holly Hobbie 1978 Christmas ornaments and the Playmobil nativity set? Oh, certainly, you can stay in your cluttered curiosity shop, if you wish--re-stacking your vintage Playboy magazines and dusting your lead-based glazed Fiesta Ware, if you must, but wouldn't it be better to make a sale? After all, with the knowledge that the unopened six pa...

My mom was an antiques dealer--sort of like those two guys on that reality show on the History Channel.   http://www.history.com/shows/american-pickers I can tell you from here that bike is not worth it.   http://www.inherited-values.com/2010/01/american-pickers/  Mom had a great eye for really good stuff--collectible china, antique lace, pop art, weird, collectible dolls and toys, jewelry, artisan rugs, coins, watches, marble, novelty piggy banks, antique slot and pachinko machines, wood Norwegian racing sailboats, vintage juke boxes, neon beer signs and other beer-related advertising, roll-top desks, oil portraits of strangers, native American craft, creepy, 19th century German children's books, taxidermied creatures, etc. I don't think my mother made that much money as an antiques dealer, though she would have made an awesome subject for a reality show. Over the course of my childhood, it became easier and easier for her to lavish time acquiring stuff and more ...

You're either an Eileen Fisher wearer or you are not. Those simple shapes and clean lines bespeak the life of a wife of a minimalist architect or a Swiss art collector at home on Sanibel Island: undyed pageboy haircuts and artsy, German made spectacles; square shoulders and an eclectic music collection that includes Ella Fitzgerald and Lightnin' Hopkins but lots of German opera. Eileen Fisher was a graphic designer from the good ol' University of Illinois, with good shoulders and a dream--I admire that. It was a good dream of elegant, relaxed drape and excellent fabrics, it just didn't work on me--more of a baroque odalisque than lanky Pablo Giacometti sculpture or a Calder mobile.