My antique Victorian pricing research over the years has been a mishmash of looking at pricing on Ebay auctions for sale (current and closed) and Googling keywords appropriate to the piece I’m looking to sell. I might go to Ruby Lane or TIAS or Trocadero or GoAntiques and do searches there, but it is more of a hassle to do so across multiple sites. A quick Google will generally, but not thoroughly, list items inventoried at those sites.

Using Ebay has always been a decent source for pricing antiques since it reflects recent market demand and prices for items with a 10-day or less sale window. Many of the sources above reflect prices at retail levels and reflect inventory that may sit for months waiting for that special buyer. Usually I don’t have any desire to sell something 7 months from now, so I sell on Ebay or off of Rare Victorian. Of course I will generally expect to receive less on Ebay than if I sold from a retail venue, but that is the price I pay for convenience and time. However, I will recount one of a few experiences I have had where Ebay far exceeded expectations later in this post.

Here’s my take at a formula for the components of maximizing antique pricing, not in order of importance:

Price = quality + condition + rarity + time + marketplace + presentation + demand + luck

All too often people are looking to sell their furniture using retail prices as their yardstick and want to sell it on Ebay in a 5-day auction. If you’re selling on Ebay - get your pricing from Ebay since that is your marketplace.

There are cases where selling on Ebay exceeds expectations but it depends on the components of my formula above. A recent item I sold was an Art Deco lamp which I paid $320 for (on Ebay, no less) with the assumption that I would resell it, hopefully at a higher price. I sold the lamp for $1,225 and I attribute that success to a few factors from my formula outweighing others, but having relative strength in all categories:

• Condition, Quality, and Rarity - I had all of these in my favor - the shade was original and rare.
• Time, and Marketplace - I believe I had it listed for 7 days on Ebay - not a place I expect to quadruple my investment, especially when I had a healthy cost to overcome. However, expanding my audience to include overseas customers was the explosive part of the equation. Two bidders, one from Saudi Arabia battled on the price.
• Presentation - I spent extra time detailing every little glass flower on the shade and the photos were bright and crisp. All too often photography is lacking on Ebay.
• Demand - I wouldn’t say I had this in my favor, but two parties that really wanted it made it happen.
• Luck - Probably played a part. Had I listed it at another time, I could have only broken even.

Had I fixed-priced the listing, I would have limited the potential upside that I experienced, so I listed it with a reserve above what I paid and started the price at $100. I had done pricing and listing research on Terapeak prior to listing the item to see what day to start, how long to run it, and at what price. I searched pricing back 90 days which is beyond the range that research directly on Ebay provides (a 30-day data window is always free from both sources).

I noticed some trends in the title keywords on the best performing Deco Lamp sales and I applied those observations to my listing. I really feel that the research I did on Terapeak helped me put together a perfect storm to sell at the best price. In my next post, I’ll try to give an overview of how to use the tool and the features that I focus on most. I’m also testing out ArtFact and will let you know my observations on that in the future as well.

Let me know your thoughts on the topic of pricing research.

Some of you have probably read something about John Henry Belter’s secretive lamination process which comprised 7-9 layers of wood, usually Rosewood. Belter steamed and soaked the thinly (< 1.6mm) sawed layers of wood and pressed it in molds (cauls) with powerful clamps.

Belter was so confident in the strength of the resulting product that it was rumored he had two demonstration chairs sitting in an office that he would throw out the window as a demonstration of their indestructibility. I have located film from 1855 of Belter throwing chairs out of his factory window and included at the top of this post for your reference. Click on the image if the animation is not playing for you to run the film.

Belter kept the secret of his lamination techniques for at least 6 years before patenting it in 1858. The patent was not for the process of lamination (which had been invented much earlier), but for the production of laminated furniture that curves in two planes, rather than one. Shortly before his death in 1863, while the factory workers were not present, Belter destroyed the molds and patterns for his work, assuring that they would not be produced upon his passing.

I’ve included a picture of a Belter scroll sofa up close so you can see the carved lamination layers of Rosewood below. If you’re actively looking for attributed Belter furniture, you can see what is currently being offered at auction by visiting JohnHenryBelter.com.

It’s funny to watch the faces of friends and coworkers as they take a tour of our house for the first time. When they learn that it was me and not my wife that selected all of the Victorian antiques that we own, you can see the wheels turning in their head for a few seconds before they rejoin the conversation. One of my close friends remarked as she walked through the house, “John, if I didn’t know you were straight…”. Good thing I don’t mention that I cook and garden, too.

The implication is that men are supposed to be golfing, watching football, and drinking beer and not ruminating on where the epergne should go. I know where they are coming from. As the image above demonstrates, there is something incongruous between exhibiting proper levels of testosterone and doing so while sitting in a Meeks Rococo sofa.

After years of extensive research, I’ve come to the conclusion that there are ways to maintain your manliness and simultaneously collect Victorian antiques. I’ve put together the Manly Man’s Guide to Buying Victorian Furniture to share what I have learned:

1. No Rococo. I know you buy Rococo because you are an admirer of laminated furniture techniques, but you need to resist the Belters and Meeks.



2. Buy lots of R.J. Horner. Seek out furniture with carved griffins and half-nude female figures. Avoid the man of the mountain pieces.



3. Sphinxes and mythical beasts are winners, so Allen and Brother pieces will also work.



4. Avoid the tête-à-tête



5. Ebonized furniture is generally a good choice due to the black color. Be wary of overly floriated Aesthetic pieces.



6. Merklen pieces are good choices due to the spiral design, brass, and ball and claw feet.



7. Hunzinger is tricky and requires an advanced eye. Avoid fringe elements, pieces of diminutive stature, and rockers.

Hopefully this guide will aid all the men out there who, like myself, enjoy collecting Victorian antique furniture. Now, I’m off to Ebay to sell some Rococo …

Does it bother anyone other than me that auction houses (and dealers) take parlor sets that have been together for 150 years and split them up to maximize the total sale? This particular set is a John Henry Belter “Fountain Elms” parlor set - 7 pieces worth $50,000-$100,000.

There is a very good chance that these pieces will part ways and never be enjoyed together as a set again. They will be sold on November 17th in three separate lots as pictured to the right. I’m sure the client will be pleased with the check they receive after the sale, but they probably already have enough money. What’s an extra $10 grand when you probably own 3 houses, 7 cars and have $25 mil in an account in Switzerland? It’s similar to me leaving the change from my latte in the tip jar at Starbucks. It’s all relative.

We’ll see what song I’m singing when I eventually sell my estate and retire to the tropics.

Someone please buy these lots and keep them together. Free storage at my house until you pick them up (auction is local to me).

Michael O’Docharty reminded me of the letter that Ulysses Grant Dietz wrote to The Magazine Antiques in response to the 1999 Anna Tobin D’Ambrosio article that I mention in this prior post. Dietz was curator of Decorative Arts at the Newark Museum in Newark, New Jersey at the time (don’t know if he still holds the position). His response is here and worth a read if the Jelliff/Schrenkeisen article topic interests you. To net it out, he believes that the Schrenkeisen Grand Duchess line of furniture was probably actually a Jelliff set that they were reselling under their own name as a kind-of “high line” of furniture.

Dietz asserts that:

“I was struck by the Jelliff-like parlor suite pictured, particularly the fact that this furniture was of a distinctly higher caliber than the bulk of what Schrenkeisen was offering. I concluded then, and maintain still, that Schrenkeisen must have been a wholesale outlet for Jelliff.”

He is speaking of the Grand Duchess in the 1872 Schrenkeisen catalog. I personally don’t see that there is such a quality disparity between the Grand Duchess and the rest of their wares. It was better than much of their furniture lines yes, but not the carvings in the sofa back for the No. 17 Divan, the crests on “Marie Antoinette No. 41″, Set No. 59, and especially “Fine Parlor Set No. 60″ from the catalog. They are of similar quality from my perspective.

I don’t believe that the inclusion of Jenny Lind carvings in the Grand Duchess set constitutes higher caliber. Jenny Lind carvings were pervasive at the time, in all levels of furniture quality, from any number of makers. That is the only element that I can point to that Dietz could be focusing on to suggest higher quality. Much of the surrounding ornamentation is of equal caliber in all those sets. During that time period, furniture makers could probably buy a component Jenny Lind carving from a parts supplier as readily as we buy dowels at Home Depot today.

I also don’t believe that Dietz would see the Jelliff chair on page 51 of his “Century of Revivals” book as exemplary or of superior work to Schrenkeisen. It is a confirmed Jelliff piece (made for Jellif’s own daughter) but it is simple, save for the carved man arms.

Dietz asks the question, and I paraphrase, “if these are all Schrenkeisen’s work, what the heck did Jellif make then”? I say he made sets of this caliber (below), which coincidentally have the same carved man arms as the Jelliff chair mentioned above:

Which if you compare to the Grand Duchess, is certainly more sophisticated.

To further answer his question, I have these thoughts:

• Jelliff used Rosewood as well as Walnut. I don’t see any Rosewood Schrenkeisen work in the catalogs, nor mention of it as an option. If Schrenkeisen did Rosewood I would think it would be mentioned in the catalog explicitly since they go out of their way to point out the French Walnut panels on the higher-end sets. I have seen attributed Rosewood Schrenkeisen chairs, but these are the contested chairs in these articles.
• I also do not see a single sofa with 4 front legs in the Schrenkeisen catalogs.

Dietz reasons, reasonably so, that Jelliff may have wanted a big player to expand his reach. I think I lean more to D’Ambrosio’s reasoning that it isn’t the case. I think Jelliff (a high-end maker) would have unlikely sold at sub-wholesale prices to a mid-level wholesaler. That would have been a very tight margin for Jelliff.

I don’t personally take a side on this debate as I see no “smoking gun” to end it. I also have only seen pictures of the pieces in question. I have not seen them in real life - so there may be quality levels in the carvings that need to be seen live. I think the only thing that would lead in the direction of solving it would be to acquire access to the original business ledgers of Schrenkeisen and/or Jelliff and see if there are payments in either direction with details on the transactions.

To further complicate this mystery for me, here are pictures of a chair that I own that has the Schrenkeisen Grand Duchess form, but it is made of Rosewood. The legs are also extensively carved and not simply turned as the Grand Duchess chairs are. The arms are carved with a figure of a sea serpent torso. The crest has a flat burl panel that I have not seen in similar chairs.