Not cavalier, just comfortable

When you sell vintage pieces for a living, you see a lot of beautiful things, even though some aren't so beautiful when you find them. You haul them back and forth between the refinisher's and the upholsterer's shops, lug them up and down stairs and into trucks and trailers. You sit on the chairs and sofas, you eat hamburgers at the tables, and your kids play hide-and-seek behind the stacks of inventory in your storeroom. You become familiar with them...and while familiarity doesn't breed contempt in this case, as the old saying goes, it does affect your attitude toward them.

First, there was the Lou Hodges table that my SIL almost put at the curb. Seriously, moving can make even the most dedicated vintage furniture lover crazy tired. Fortunately, he got a good night's sleep before he tossed the piece and eventually partnered with Gerard O'Brien at Reform Gallery in Los Angeles to sell it.

Lou Hodges table, almost tossed

Then there was the Richard Galef trash can (like this one I found on Etsy) that was used for dirty diapers when both the grandsons were babies. I'm sure there are lots of people who would treat a designer piece with a little more respect than that. (Although, in defense of my daughter and SIL, I will say that it took us a long time to identify it as a Galef piece. She got it at an estate sale for $1.00.)

Richard Galef trash can for Ravenware
etsy.com - OrbitingDebris

And, finally, there is the Planner Group coffee table by Paul McCobb that sits, as we speak, in my daughter and SIL's living room. I'll post a picture of one I found on Gerard's site, because the one we all use on a daily basis is so covered with mail and toys that you can't even see the top of it. We sit on it, eat on it, spill on it, play with toy trucks on it, stand on it and generally treat it as if it's indestructible, which it's proved to be so far.

Planner Group coffee table by Paul McCobb
reformgallery.1stdibs.com

Does this make us jaded? Unappreciative? Cavalier? I don't think so. These are tools of our trade, just as wrenches and hammers are the tools of other trades. Once they're fully restored and in our store, we handle them very carefully, so they'll be as perfect as possible when customers take them home. When they're in our own homes, we don't abuse them...but we do use them, just as people have been using them for the past 60-some-odd years. We figure if they've held up that long, they'll hold up for a good while longer.

The moral of this story: When you find a piece you just can't live without, buy it. Enjoy it. And don't be afraid to really live with it.

Another mystery solved

Back in May, I posted about a trashcan I saw listed on eBay as a "Mid Century Atomic Mategot Style Tin Wire Trash Can Bin" and priced at $159. At the time, I didn't know who designed the trashcan, but I was able to determine with a reasonable degree of certainty that it wasn't designed by Mathieu Matégot, and his designs became the focus of that post. My daughter and SIL have an identical trashcan that they got free at an estate sale, and I also offered the opinion at the time that "free" was probably a more realistic price than $159, but now I'm not so sure about that.

wantcy.com

I was looking at my copy of Ann Kerr's Collector's Encyclopedia of Russel Wright for yesterday's post, and on page 4 of the Acknowlegements, there is was! The trashcan! Kerr had included this copy of a 1953 Richards Morgenthau/Raymor ad:

Richards Morgenthau/Raymor ad
Collector's Encyclopedia of Russel Wright  by Ann Kerr

The ad read, "These famous names and brands have identified Richards Morgenthau as America's outstanding distributor of contemporary gifts and decorative accessories." And right there, along with designs by Ben Seibel, Tony Paul, George Nelson, Paul McCobb and Russel Wright was a picture of the trashcan identified as having been designed by "Dick Galef" for Ravenware.

Close-up of the 1953 Richards Morgenthau/Raymor ad 

I just love a mystery with a totally unexpected ending. I bet my daughter and SIL will like this one too. And maybe now that they know what they have, they'll quit filling it with dirty diapers!

Update 8/12/11: Jonathan Goldstein had lunch with Richard Galef yesterday and learned some things I need to pass on to you. First of all, according to Galef,  he has never gone by "Dick," so why he was referred to as such in the Morgenthau/Raymor ad is yet another mystery. Also, this trash can, included in my original post, is a design by Galef for Ravenware, not by Mathieu Matégot, as it was incorrectly attributed.

architonic.com

We all know that, 50+ years after the fact, sellers and bloggers today are going to make mistakes in identifying pieces/designers and that the misinformation is then perpetuated by exposure on the Internet, which is why I post corrections as soon as new information comes to my attention. That poses a serious problem for today's collectors, for if even the ads and brochures that came out back then contain information that is less than factual, what will we do after there's no one left from that era to set us straight?