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Unbelievably,
antique restoration is a highly controversial topic. Amongst collectors and
enthusiasts, the debate has raged since the first awareness of a concept of
value beyond function. While what is appropriate remains unresolved, antiques
live and die by subjective rules and restorations. This article provides some
insight into what antique furniture is, how value is derived, and some
prospective on restoration.
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There
are several schools of thought on antique furniture restoration. The
philosophies range drastically, and the effect on value and lifespan of your
piece is paramount in effect when your choices are set. Knowing your
personality, knowing your financial situation and your goals for your
antiquing, understanding the fundamentals of aging woods and finishes, and
understanding the options is key to success when dabbling in the antique
market.
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The
jury is still out on the schools of Philosophy ? nobody is the end all of
authority. The owner of a piece chooses its destiny, and integrates his or her
personality into its history through the entire tenure of their possession.
This integration may increase or decrease its value in a subjective world of
appraisals. Remember, the decisions are personal, and should never be
second-guessed. Make educated choices, and enjoy your antique furniture.
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The
first school; do
nothing, accept the piece as it appears no matter how poor the condition. Buy
only pieces in good condition, and avoid any antique that is not already in
useable condition, as museums do. This is not feasible for most; the price of
the few remaining pristine pieces is out of reach for all but museums and the
upper crust. If you can afford to practice this ideology, by all means indulge,
do your part to preserve the piece in an environment conducive to longevity of
wood and finishes. Do not use the piece; maintain it for your enjoyment and the
enjoyment of others outside the burden of daily abuse.
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The
second school; acquire
antiques that with skillful restoration will return to a state of beauty and
have practical use within your home, maintaining a good percentage of the
antique value. Antiques of fair to poor value are in most cases savable.
Unapparent to the untrained eye, these pieces possess great beauty and can
continue to offer functional use in your home once they receive proper care.
With proper conservation, these pieces maintain a good portion of their antique
value, and are no longer an eyesore.
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The
third school; strip it
bare, sand it down, and fix it any way you can to make it look new and
functional again no matter how much of the true antique value is lost. All but
a few outspoken members of the antique community, including the authors of this
article, hate this philosophy. The worst possible option involves removing
shellac to replace it with a modern finish; this is a grave transgression
against history and immediately negates all antique value.
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Stripping
a piece to bare wood removes the history of a piece, it destroys the continuity
of the timeline created by generations of use. This option is only acceptable
when the original finish has already been lost, usually through previous
ill-advised restorations, and there is no choice but to remove paint or lacquer
and return a natural shellac finish or paint appropriate to the period. If the
value has already been lost, there is no harm in removing a bad finish;
especially when the plan is to replace it with a proper one.
A Day in the Life of an Antique
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Most
collectors of antique furniture want to use it in their homes, while furniture
acquired for investment or display in a museum is for inspection only. The
angles are very different. Museums and investors want their pieces to be in a
condition and environment conducive to mitigating natural deterioration. The
piece must remain true to it?s found form, and in this way the maximum antique
value is preserved.
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It
is fascinating to ponder how a 250-year-old piece of furniture manages to
survive in such good condition while perusing through a museum. The conclusion
is simple in almost all cases; they did not. Furniture is just that furniture ?
in 1910 a Ford Model T was a car; it was transportation and nothing more.
People drove their car, maintained the car, and scrapped it when it wore out.
Today, you would not see one as a daily driver, and you would not see someone
randomly drilling a hole to mount a mismatched seat for a functional
replacement. Today it?s an antique, but at the time it was simply a car to be
used and abused, and maintained as required with resources as available, all in
the cause of point A to point B. Furniture is no different, it was used ? made
to perform its practical function. Did you think your first addition Spider Man
was worth anything when you tore out the ad in the back? Did you drag your
original Barbie around the world and back again; then decide to cut her hair?
Think about it ?
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Museum
furniture has received much needed attention in one form or another just like
the furniture in your home has or may need. Museums maintain entire staffs of
conservation and restoration specialists standing ready behind the scenes to
keep the existing collection preserved and bring newly acquired pieces up to
snuff.
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Many
museums keep a fulltime paid and highly qualified staff, specialists who almost
never work for the public. The time it takes to restore a piece to museum
specifications puts the price range out of scope for all but the wealthiest
antique enthusiasts. This leaves the public, in most cases, to the self-taught,
and the branching out cabinet or strip shop that accepts the occasional antique
for repair.
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There
is one undisputed fact concerning old furniture 50 years and back, it?s that it
has suffered lots of use and abuse. There is an old adage that says, ?Three
moves are as bad as a fire.? Since America is a mobile country, our ancestors
made many moves by car, by wagon, by boat or rail and truck. Anybody that has
moved has quickly learned that movers can be guerrillas. It?s a wonder that any
furniture survived this brutality at all.
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Defining
the Periods
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In
the Early American furniture world, there are classes of antique furniture.
Classic definitions of an antique describe handmade, pre-machine era, furniture
dated from 1640 to 1840. This timeline includes the great periods and is
referred to as period furniture. The great periods include:
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Hand
made stood for quality, sturdy, functional pieces of furniture designed to
endure for generations. Misconceptions of this concept are that each piece was
made one at a time by a small shop producing each work. True in some cases,
these are the most valuable pieces when properly documented. However, most hand
made pieces were made in a factory, an assembly line of skilled workers
specializing in a key area of design, joinery, carving, or finishing. These
craftsmen were proud of their work, each contributing their part to the whole.
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Enter
the Victorian period (1840-1900) ushering in unrefined machinery and
questionably designed, poorly constructed, mass-produced furniture. The
complexity of furniture construction remained just out of reach of the ability
of the machinery of the time to produce quality, and the advent of these
devices resulted in significant drops in the skill of the workers. Unlike the
computerized operations of today, the technology was simply not available to
mass-produce sturdy and quality pieces. The Victorian era has never been recognized
by the mainstream antique community as having produced works of any great
value. The entrance of this period ended the volume of high quality hand made
pieces, leaving only the small shops to produce pieces of previously expected
quality.
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By
the turn of the century, things improved a notch with the entrance of Mission,
Art Nouveau,
and lines from manufacturers such as Stickley producing Golden Oak. Quickly
falling out of style, a mass quantity of this furniture was tossed to the
curbside through the 50?s and 60?s.
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With
this, comes modern furniture, artificial veneers such as Formica, plastics, and
metal. Tastes changed, modernized, and cast aside the classical concept of wood
furnishings. Modern furniture is out of our scope for this article, so the
descriptions of this era will conclude here.
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Class
1: As previously
discussed, the classical requirements for furniture to be deemed an ?Antique,?
are that it has to have been hand made in 1840 or earlier. With obvious
exceptions made for high quality handmade pieces through the turn of the
century, especially those with a noteworthy and documented history. This
defines the first class.
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Class
2: Time evolves all
things, and the antique world is no different. Now that we have entered the
twenty first century, a whole new class of antique furniture is emerging. The
class consists of inherited or heirloom machine made furniture, including
Victorian and the once curbside ornament Golden Oak styles. The possessions of
the baby boomers are now being passed on to Generation X as a result of the
downsizing from family homes to retirement communities. This furniture may have
been purchased by the grandparents, passed to the baby boom children, some true
antiques and others passing both sentimental and a virgin antique value along
with an otherwise garage sale piece, creating class two antiques from the
previously defined collectibles.
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Mission
furniture, with Golden oak leading the charge, now shows a sudden surge in
value keeping up with investment gains previously shown only in classic antique
pieces. Somehow, you can completely refinish and restore a piece, and its value
increases. An uneasy feeling for antique conservationists, this trend is a
great opportunity to expand their expertise into these pieces, a world where
change is accepted without question because the piece is not a hand made
antique. Restoring the piece to near original condition does not hurt the
value, but many clients request many of the markings remain intact ? especially
if it?s the initials they carved as a child. Modern homes don?t allow for
beat-up furniture, and grandma?s dining set may fit perfectly if it were just a
little cleaner in appearance. If you possess such a piece, many are of superior
quality wood and construction than what is available in the mass-market Ikea
world of today. Restoring these pieces may cost more than their antique value
may ever regain, but finding equivalent quality replacements commonly runs
three times the cost of restoration ? and this option will lose all family
history in the piece.
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Class
3: Generic machine made
furniture of the 1930?s and 40?s is now overflowing into the homes of the
nuclear families. This furniture has absolutely no true antique value; it is
collectable, but barely. It?s restored for sentimental or replacement cost
comparison reasons only. Most of this furniture has been used and abused now
for two full generations, and is on its way for use in a third. The lifespan of
these pieces is a testament to the improvements in machining technology by this
era. This class makes up the majority of pieces now being hauled to antique
restorers and strip shops across the country.
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The
antique world is, although it will insult some, much like a casino. The value
of a piece is truly subjective and falls to the mere whims of whomever may be
attending the auction that day. There is only one guaranteed way to determine
what a piece is worth, regardless of what anyone tells you. That is simply to
sell it ? bring the piece to auction and let it go. Nobody can tell you exactly
what a piece will sell for, unless they are willing to buy it at that moment,
but they can estimate value.
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The
factors involved are both tangible and intangible. The condition, the
structure, the finish, the hardware, the age, the maker, and known owners, all
play obvious key rolls. Opinions span the spectrum when it comes to what value
restorations increase or decrease. Where some say restore it, save it for the
future, others say that destroys the history. The bottom line, it's your piece
so it?s your choice.
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A second example, a piece brought to an auction that happens to fit the exact need of three parties. The three parties bit this piece up to $12,000. Perhaps the range expected was $4,000 - $6,000. A very happy seller receives a significant sum for this piece simply because there was an unpredicted bidding war. The winning bidder decides the piece doesn?t fit as well and he believed, and brings it back to auction
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