Up and down the country, they are burning their stock to keep warm.
Faced with one of the worst winters on
record they have no option.
With gas prices at an all time high and
electricity now a luxury, they have to make ends meet.
In an age when most Victorian tables
are now cheaper to burn than buying coal and with massive warehouses
to heat.
There is only one option reduce storage costs by burning
wardrobes.
They are only worth a tenner at auction anyhow.
What the bloody 'ell has happened to
Mahogany, Rosewood and Walnut this is ridiculous.
Antique furniture is now that cheap
that you cant fuel your fire for less.
Can you believe it, the furniture
retail index has dropped again for the umpteenth year on the run. Its
crazy. One dealer I know had his pension tied up in quality stuff and
he told me its worth a fifth of what it was.
It cant get any cheaper And Joe Public
educated by Bargain Hunt are more interested in cheap and cheerful
than quality.
Where is all the money going to?
MDF
and chipboard rubbish?
What is wrong with the public? What is wrong
with the public's sense of reality when they would rather add to
Sweden's balance of trade, while antique dealers are smashing up
their chest of drawers, just to stay warm through this storm spread
winter.
What’s more the same people complain that the high street is
dying on its feet.
Cant you give them a break, they are
hard working people who deserve to have food and clothes for their
families. Some of them are second and third generation antique
dealers, some even more. There may not be a fourth. What’s more the
same people complain that the high street is dying on its feet.
And the great British public wont even
give them a meagre crust.
Buy antiques now before they are all
burnt.....or painted with Farrow and Ball.
Its all the same shops these days, they
say. They love it when they go to France and find all those Brocante
shops full of things that the French wont buy.
They bring pieces home, and tell
everyone as if its a trophy, “Its French”. Then they go and add
to China's economy and accessories it in John Lewis with stuff made
by people paid two pound a month. While the local antique shops are disappearing and will soon become as rear as a glass cased Dodo.
Antique dealers are green they stop
things being destroyed, they recycle.
Nowadays if you recycle a bit of wet
cardboard or a squashed milk carton there is definitely someone who
will give out a grant for it.
If the person running the recycling
firm is a black, one legged lesbian well there are hundreds of
thousands available. So where is the help for antique recyclers?
Where is the aid to stop them going to
the wall, going out of business and allowing their shops to be taken
over by charity shops, that get tax relief.
The same charity shops are generally
full of the lower middle class trying to get the stuff before the antique
dealers get it.
There was recently one tweed suited twerp on
the Antique Road show, proud as punch that he had bought a vase worth
two grand in a charity shop for £37.50. Grinning like a Cheshire Cat. “No £36.50” he
corrected the valuer.
He should have been made to pay the
charity that he robbed, back, or the staff in the shop who valued it, without getting a second opinion, should be made to pay.
Whatever the case, the charity was
done out of a couple of grand while Billy Brewster wallowed in glory
as if he was clever.
If it had of been forty five quid he
wouldn’t have chanced it.
Just think how much Oxfam lose a year
by not getting the prices right.
So mahogany and walnut is out of style and decades of furniture dealing
experience does not count for a jot these days.
Most warehouse-men have burnt their
Millers Guide years ago, to keep warm, because they are not worth the
paper they are written on any more. They are so out of date, that it
is hilarious, especially when someone comes into the shop trying to
sell something quoting their prices.
Though its no joke when a member of
the public comes in the shop taking about the table they bought 15
years ago for three hundred quid and says “There’s one in the
Millers Guide for £550” and you have to tell them its worth a
hundred if they are lucky.
So does anyone care if your heritage is
broken up and burnt because its cheaper being used for cooking on a barbecue than charcoal.
The exception of course has been Art
Deco furniture.
This is strange as most of it that was made in
England is, lets say, not the best quality.
Yes there are Epstein and Hille, but
most of the stuff that passes for Art Deco may in fact be post war.
The look is there though. The blonde veneers seem to brighten up a room where mahogany will dull it.
But I still love a good grain, and I
hope an appreciation for quality timber will be revived and it will come back.
But for now, Art Deco furniture and post
war design is where the money has gone. It looks so modern in an apartment.
And when all the brown furniture has been
burnt so dealers can stay warm,some bright spark will realise that a
good patina is back in style, and everyone will run around buying
Georgian again and it will all start all start to go up in
price....only this time there may be less of it around.
Who will be the brave one who will hold
their nerve and stack a warehouse high with good stock, the stuff
they used to want years ago? Will they be the clever ones?
Because the stuff is for nothing it
cant go any cheaper, though someone did said to me last year......and
it has.
Copper and Brass Arts and Crafts Candlestick. 
