Collectors other than music, what was your favorite find of 2010?

[BFrank]

8 hours ago, jazzbo said:

Brooks, don't envy me. I collected WHEN I had space and no longer have it, I now have a storage space for books, instruments, stereo equipment and discs that costs me money I can't afford each month and despite a motivation to please my wife and divest myself of all these I find it very hard and very frustrating. Better to have the space for three and enjoy those three (and those are a nice three to have though I'd HAVE to have a Strat in place of the Tele. . . I'm just not a Tele man, definitely a Strat man.)

Oh, that IS frustrating, Lon! A storage locker is a dangerous thing to have. That camera collection ate up quite a bit of $$ in storage fees over the years. Consider it a long-term project. 

Funny you should mention the Tele ......... I've been thinking of switching it out for a Strat lately. I don't play it much now. Fender has a new line of MIM guitars including a "Deluxe Stratocaster HSS" that has the features I'm looking for: whammy bar, bridge humbucker with an S-1 switch to split the coils, noiseless single coil PUs and a reasonable price that won't break the bank.

Edited January 9, 2017 by BFrank

[jazzbo]

Yes, there's a world of Strats out there, and MIM Fenders can be very high quality these days. Sounds like this one suits your needs. I have an American one that was a Guitar Center exclusive that has all but the split coil switch (it has S-1 for all pickups that is not a split coil) and has a mahogany body, a really nice dark sounding Strat.

Personally I wish all my Strats were hard tail and not whammy bar bridges!

 

[BFrank]

One last guitar comment. Fender has an interesting 'design your own' guitar program in their Mod Shop. Price varies according to parts of course, but you can put together a really nice instrument for about $1,700. I keep thinking about this, but just can't justify the cost as an amateur part-time musician.

[Jim R]

One thing I forgot to mention.  The subject of cameras reminded me that we've bought and sold a few in the past, when we (my wife, her parents, and myself) were dealers of 20th century decorative arts (art deco, industrial design, mid-century modern).  That is- or was, my other primary focus as a collector.  We haven't been doing that for about 20 years, and haven't added anything to our collection for years, but we still have a lot of items (furniture, lamps, radios, etc) from that time.

The cameras were never something we used, but were bought and sold for the appeal of their design (by a famous industrial designer named Walter Dorwin Teague).  Brooks, you will no doubt know more about the actual cameras than I do.

 

[BFrank]

Very nice examples of those cameras, Jim. Especially the box with that Gift Kodak! The 3 Beau Brownies are very cool, too.
I actually have a Bantam Special (the pin striped black deco item) in very nice condition similar to yours. I've seen it on display at MoMA in NYC, too. They're definitely collectors items, as are all those you pictured which are in great condition.

Thanks for sharing!

[Dmitry]

Wow, I've never seen these of decorated cameras. They sort of remind me of Art Deco cigarette cases. Unique.

The b&w strped camera looks like a Packard radiator grill. Very 1930s.

Thanks for showing!

[Jim R]

Just to be clear, I got all of those camera photos online.  We did buy and sell a few examples of those cameras over the years, but we own none of them now.  Since many people seem to appreciate and enjoy art deco/moderne/machine age design, I'll post a few photos of some of the things we've collected (again, I'll just find similar examples online).

The great Walter Teague also designed these glass (mirrored) radios for the Sparton company, a few examples of which (the smaller table models) we owned at one time.

The extremely rare console model, the "Nocturne", has sold at auction for more than $50K.

[Jim R]

A few things we've kept...

Another Teague design:

 

... and another lamp, this one by Walter von Nessen

 

... a Fada bullet radio

 

Isamu Noguchi's "Radio Nurse", for Zenith (an intercom speaker created for home safety following the Lindbergh kidnapping scare)

... and two items from 1939 and 1940 that I loved, but don't own anymore:

[BFrank]

Teague definitely had a flair for deco product design!

I've seen that large mirrored disk radio in a gallery or museum before. Very striking in person, too. And Noguchi's "Radio Nurse" has been appraised on Antiques Roadshow

[Jim R]

Yup, I saw that Radio Nurse appraisal, and many years ago I saw the above Von Nessen lamp on the show, when they visited a museum in Minneapolis.  I never miss an episode of the Roadshow.  Have always enjoyed the UK version too.

[BFrank]

13 hours ago, Jim R said:

Yup, I saw that Radio Nurse appraisal, and many years ago I saw the above Von Nessen lamp on the show, when they visited a museum in Minneapolis.  I never miss an episode of the Roadshow.  Have always enjoyed the UK version too.

I'm kind of addicted to the Roadshow, too. Haven't seen many of the UK editions, though.

Those items you kept are very cool for sure! Are you familiar with Greta Grossman? I have a few of her original Cobra-style lamps - both desk and floor models - that my parents bought 'way back when'. Also lucky to have the classic Eames Lounge Chair & Ottoman from the 60s (or maybe earlier).

Edited January 11, 2017 by BFrank

[Big Beat Steve]

On 8.1.2017 at 4:50 AM, BFrank said:

Don't remember seeing this topic before.

 

Neither do I. Fascinating ....

2 hours ago, BFrank said:

 Also lucky to have the classic Eames Lounge Chair & Ottoman from the 60s (or maybe earlier).

Mine is from 1967. Been in the family from new and found its way to my home in 2000. My preferred relaxing chair, obviously, for listening to my music and reading. I had to have most of the leather redone by a Vitra specialist in 2012 but it was well worth it.

Those radios shown above are just fantastic. I have a few older sets, though for reasons of overall style of the "rest" of our house most of them are from the (relatively) advanced European school of design of the 50s (Braun, etc.).

As for non-music collecting finds of the past year, not much in my "other" collecting hobby - classic cars and some automobilia that go with them (no, I am no Jay Leno, not even by a VERY, VERY long shot - my wife would kill me ), but a couple of nice finds (that might actually go with the radios shown here earlier, style-wise) were these mags on Paris 30s/40s motor shows:

 

Edited January 11, 2017 by Big Beat Steve

[Dmitry]

3 hours ago, BFrank said:

I'm kind of addicted to the Roadshow, too. Haven't seen many of the UK editions, though.

 

Wife and I went to a show taping in Hartford about 8-9 years ago. It's much less glamorous than you'd think. Sort of a mill. I'll leave it at that, so you won't get disenchanted.

[Leeway]

On January 9, 2017 at 10:22 PM, Mark Stryker said:

First edition of James Baldwin's "Notes of a Native Son." Fine condition with dust jacket. Got it at a great antiquarian bookstore I visit every year in Hallowell, Maine.

Nice find! Amazing how books circulate around, in their own inscrutable ecology.

[Jim R]

Steve, those mags are beautiful little works of art.

We tried to get Roadshow tickets when they were filming in town several years ago, but missed out.  I still ask myself what we would have brought... probably our Normandie poster (a 1939 commemorative edition which we've never had appraised) and a very rare moderne metal/glass lamp that isn't signed or labeled.  We think it was designed by Kurt Versen.

Brooks, I am indeed familiar with Greta Grossman, although I'm no expert on her work, and I don't think we ever sold any of her pieces.

We also own an Eames lounge chair, which we bought new through Modernica in L.A. about 20 years ago when we moved from our 1930's house to our current place, built in the 50's.  That's when we sold off some of our deco collection and started collecting some mid-century modern.  We bought several nice contemporary examples of some of the classic designs from Modernica (the Eames lounge, an Eames storage unit where they allowed you to design the configuration yourselves; a couple of LCW's, and a "hang-it-all"; Noguchi coffee and end tables; etc), and also found some original pieces (Eames compact sofa; Saarinen womb chair and tulip dining set; George Nelson slat bench, bubble floor lamp, and ball clock; Kem Weber trimline desk for Heywood Wakefield; Arteluce triennale floor lamp).  Just for fun, some photos of similar examples taken from the web:

 

 

The current episode of Antiques Roadshow features a rare early Eames 420N shelving unit:  http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/roadshow/season/21/fort-worth-tx/appraisals/herman-miller-storage-unit-ca-1950--201604A05/

[BFrank]

Jim, you and your wife sure have an eye for design. I was just about to mention the Eames/Miller shelving unit in the current episode, too!

We also have one of those red molded plywood chairs and a George Nelson slat bench that you showed, but they're not vintage - they're about 6 years old. When we moved we went 'Herman Miller shopping' and also got a "surfboard table" and a dining room set.

These are examples of 2 of the Grossman lamps we have.

 

 

[Big Beat Steve]

That colorful "hang-it-all" is funny. It must have existed in lots of variations. I bought one in that style (though the wire arrangement is simplified) at a vintage fleamarket in the UK sometime in the 90s but in the end didn't fit it because our (50s) coat racks out in the hall are quite different (though based on a wire design too) and offer more room to hang stuff. It still must be stowed away in some box somewhere.
That's the kind of odd objects you can get carried away with.

[Jim R]

2 hours ago, BFrank said:

Jim, you and your wife sure have an eye for design. I was just about to mention the Eames/Miller shelving unit in the current episode, too!

We also have one of those red molded plywood chairs and a George Nelson slat bench that you showed, but they're not vintage - they're about 6 years old. When we moved we went 'Herman Miller shopping' and also got a "surfboard table" and a dining room set.

These are examples of 2 of the Grossman lamps we have.

 

 

Yeah, our LCW's came via Modernica, around 1998.  The vintage red examples can get pretty expensive.  Our Nelson bench is vintage, and we really lucked out... found it at a garage sale (in San Jose, no less!) just a couple of blocks from our house...  $40.

When I tried a web search for our Modernica/Eames storage unit (designated the ESU 230 due to the custom 2 X 3 configuration that they offered, which was not an original configuration back in the day), I found very few results, which makes me wonder how unusual/rare they are now.

Lamps were always near the top of my list of favorite vintage design objects.  So many variations!  Your Grossman pieces are very cool.  I love adjustable lamps.

So, I just tried a web search, hoping to find some info on the "mystery" lamp I mentioned above.  I've tried this in the past, and never found anything.  This time I did.  I've tried various designer names (Donald Deskey, Kem Weber, etc), but I always suspected it might be by Kurt Versen, and sure enough I found something close enough to convince me, even though the one I found is slightly different.

Ours looks exactly like this (circa 1935 Versen design), except that the shade material on ours is comprised of dozens of individual thin, vertically mounted clear glass cylindrical rods instead of the silk on this one.  Versen apparently used parchment on another similar model from 1934, OR... these examples I found originally had the glass rods like ours, and they were broken and repaired using these other materials.

Associating a piece with a great designer is of course a big deal, and I've been wondering about this lamp for over 25 years!  My instincts are also telling me that the shade design using the glass, being more stylish and difficult/expensive to execute might make our example a bit more special, even if there were examples where silk or parchment were the original material used.  Anyway, this is exciting for me to be discovering this today.  Glad I got into this discussion!  

[Big Beat Steve]

The problem with this kind of collectabilia is that you have to have a huge apartment or house in order to set up these items in a somewhat natural "habitat". Items that are natural "collectables" (or fit for accumulating) such as records or books can be hoarded in almost unlimited quantities, but lamps and chairs or tables and wall decoration items and the like? Once you exceed a certain quantity of stuff you have this makes it difficult four you to budge in your own quarters and therefore awkward.

Another problem with some items that you intend to really "live with" is that they have to fit your needs at least to some extent too. Some of those shelving units are very nice but what can you do with them if the paper you accumulate exceeds a certain quantity (but the space available doesn't)? I've seen very nice pieces of shelving and storage units in period photos and the settings ARE striking, but they were usually set up holding maybe 5 to 10 books, a mag draped out nicely and one or two other objects and that's that. Otherwise they might fast look crowded. So I am fairly pleased I have been able to use all those 50s Scandinavian "String" bookshelves all along, for example. As long as there are walls (running out fast now, though ... ) I can add more of the same and yet keep everything in style.

[Dmitry]

16 hours ago, Jim R said:

The current episode of Antiques Roadshow features a rare early Eames 420N shelving unit:  http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/roadshow/season/21/fort-worth-tx/appraisals/herman-miller-storage-unit-ca-1950--201604A05/

I'm sorry, but I call bullshit on this appraisal. Well, not the appraisal itself, but the owner and her reaction. No way she had no idea  of the value of this unit. Everything can be appraised very easily these days, it would take minutes on-line.

Schlepping a large, fragile, and expensive piece to the venue, standing on line for hours, just to burst into hysterical tears...gmafb. Plus, she says she has at least two other units like that..obviously she's a collector. ARS has been known for staged, phony appraisals. This is an example of one. 

[Jazzmoose]

I picked up a copy of The Happy Hollisters and the Monster Mystery either last year or the year before, finally completing the series.  These are the books my mom used to teach me to read before she died, so while I wouldn't recommend them for reading, they're pretty special to me. 

[Dmitry]

Can you guys help me id this lamp I got at an estate sale a few weeks ago?

There was a label on it, but only the glue remains. 

Edited January 18, 2017 by Dmitry

[Dan Gould]

Hydra?

 

 

 

 

 

[Jim R]

I can't say that I recognize the design, but it's interesting.  Any idea how old it may be?  Got any more photos?  Any showing the underside of the base?

I wonder how many switches are on that thing!

[Jazzmoose]

7 hours ago, Dan Gould said:

Hydra?

 

 

 

 

 

If one bulb burns out, two more take it's place...