Hello Everyone
This time of the year is often an opportunity to enjoy a little autumn relaxing, spending time with the family and friends, preparing for the colder months ahead. It is also a time to reflect on the year past, and review goals and priorities for the year.
Last year we saw the website up and running, and this year we have expanded the site to incorporate on-line shopping with a gallery of items for sale.
In-store, the challenge of a changing market saw strong selling in the decorative arts area, also some good furniture sales with a Georgian Revival Chinoserie ebonised bookcase, a fine French two door ormolou mounted vitrine, along with a wonderful early Victorian cylinder bookcase finding new homes in the surrounding area. We did several fairs in 2007, with the highlight being the rather water-logged AAADA fair in Sydney in August. The run up to Christmas was as usual, hectic with packing for the Rotary Club of Palm Beach antique fair on the Gold Coast and exhibiting at the vintage clothing fair at Malvern, on a hot week end just before Christmas. The Ballarat fair held in March was also a hot affair, crowded with people, with the need for a fan essential to remain cool, calm and focused on task of explaining the various items on the stand and encouraging the many collectors to purchase.
Summer, and the ensuing warmer autumn days were conducive to relaxing, walking Cossie at the beach and catching up on some reading. This year I undertook some to do some research, ploughing my way through several editions of the British publication, “The Decorative Yearbook,” along with several copies of The Connoisseur – A Magazine for Collectors.
 “The Connoisseur” is a good example of the fact that the international quality antiques press is hardly anything new. It was started in September 1901 by the publishers Otto in London. Like similar publications today, it relied heavily on advertising revenue and took advertisements according to the country in which it was sold. Its circulation was such that it was published worldwide - including Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Canada, India, USA, France and Italy.
Published monthly, it was not cheap in its day. Twelve shillings (now $1) for a year’s subscription, or sixteen shillings by post - seventeen shillings if posted overseas. Advertising was 2d a word (the paragraph above would have cost 65p to enter, more than a year’s subscription).
The editorial features were scholarly works on the finest examples of all fields of antiques - very much like today’s publication “Antiques and Art in Victoria”. But apart from the lack of quality colour illustrations, one significant difference between then and now is the conspicuous absence of any mention of antiques fairs.
The substantial increase in value of antiques since then cannot be explained by inflation or by items being another hundred years older. Perhaps more people with more money chasing the same things is the answer. Typical advertisements include “Georgian rush-seated spindle back chairs” (then 100 years old) at 12 shillings ($1) each, “antique oak Welsh dressers” at £7 each, “a set of twelve Cromwellian chairs” for £60 and “a 16th century walnut armoire” for £175!
Reproduction of antique ceramics, silver and furniture is nothing new. Indeed, many of the items then sold as reproductions may by now have been accepted as the real thing, particularly where identical materials and methods of construction were used. In any case, they are now likely to be afforded antique status in their own right.
Publication of The Connoisseur seems to have ended around World War I. But such magazines were plentiful in their day and are still available at around $25 a copy - a lot cheaper when found in quantity. They give an inexpensive and contemporary insight into the international antiques trade of the early 20th century. Photograph shows “The Connoisseur”, April 1908 edition, which can be viewed at Eaglemont Antiques.
Whereby, The Studio Magazine as it was called way back in 1893 was also founded in Britain, and featured both the fine and decorative arts. It initially was a magazine that promoted the work of progressive designers such as Charles Rennie Mackintosh and Charles Voysey to a wide audience in Britain and abroad, and was especially influential in continental Europe. The Studio began publishing The Decorative Art yearbook in 1906 to “meet the needs of that ever-increasing section of the public who take interest in the application of art to the decoration and general equipment of their homes.” This annual survey which became increasingly international in its outlook, was dedicated to the latest currents in architecture, interiors, furniture and lighting along with ceramics
In the 1920’s Decorative Art yearbooks began promoting Modernism and was in later years the prominent champion of “Good Design”. Published from the 1950’s onwards by Studio Vista, the yearbooks continued to provide a remarkable overview of each decade, featuring avant-garde and often experimental designs alongside more mainstream products.
In addition to the balance and harmony of their shapes, ceramics derive so much of their beauty from the combined effects of glaze, decoration and texture and yet the many exquisite pieces are not only of the past, in the sense of exhibiting the best traditions of a centuries-old medium, but are at the same time, vital expressions of our age, in which new technicians and new conceptions add their contributions to the perpetual growth of ceramic art.
Pictured in the gallery at www.eaglemont antiques.com.au
are some fine examples of 1950’s design, which are in-store at present:
1950’s EAMES ERA BIOMORPHIC STRIPED STUDIO POTTERY VASE IN BLACK WITH GREEN STRIPES.
FULLY IMPRESSED ARTIST’S & FACTORY MARKS TO BASE
1950’s A SWISS STUDIO POTTERY EAMES ERA JUG WITH CREAM BODY WITH YELLOW & BLACK STRIPED BODY. SIGNED ON BASE; SCHWEIZ POLIZEI FERNSCHLESSEN AUSZEICHNUG
Other Items of interest
A Late 19TH century standing map reading magnifier
A 19th century Le Blond (London) Oval Print
“Please Remember the Grotto”
A nostalgic picture of early nineteenth century rural life. Well produced, brilliant in colour, now collectors' items, competing as they did, in terms of popularity, with Baxter's prints
A wonderful lush green Victorian plush velvet piano shawl
An exquisite enamelled and gilded amberina glass wine goblet by Moser (Austria)
A superb continental silver evening reticule with fitted interior complete with matching coin purse.
Circa 1880.
Some interesting and unusual items from The Diana Cameron Collection (Tasmania) are also for sale.
2008 CAMBERWELL ANTIQUES SHOW
Once again Eaglemont Antiques will be exhibiting at the Camberwell Antique Show in June. This fair, like a good wine just keeps improving with age.
Crowds are always keen for the fair to open on the Friday morning, with dealers from all around Australia presenting their wares, indicating the heightened interest in antiques and collectables at present. With shows such as “Collectors”, The Antiques Road Show” the interest seems to be growing with a lot more younger collectors coming into the market.
It’s an ideal time to cone to the fair and see what Eaglemont Antiques have on offer!
Fair Opening Times
Friday 27th June 10 a.m. – 7 p.m.
Saturday 28th June 10 am – 7 pm
Sunday 29th June 10 am – 6 pm
Venue: The Camberwell Centre (Camberwell Town Hall) Camberwell Road, Camberwell
AAADA FAIR – SEPTEMBER 2008
For its eighth annual fair, in 2008, the Australian Antique and Art Dealers Association, has returned to Wharf 8, Sydney, located on Sussex Street between Erskine and Napoleon Streets, only minutes away from the CBD, Darling Harbour and King Street Wharf.
In September 2008, Eaglemont Antiques will be exhibiting, in this expansive space and once again will showcase an impressive collection of antiques. Because every piece for sale has been vetted and approved by the industry experts, you can be confident that you are getting exactly what they have paid for.
Fair Opening times Gala Opening and preview
Wednesday 17th September - from 6pm
Thursday, Friday, Saturday 18th, 19th, 20th September
11am - 8pm
Sunday 21st September
11am - 6pm
Venue: Wharf 8, On Sussex Street between Erskine and Napoleon Streets, Sydney
Further information on both fairs can be obtained by phoning 03 9497 4195.
 Ah! A new year and once again lots of sunshine means lots of swimming, walks in the park and generally exercising to keep me in trim. This time of the year is “show-off” time for me when I go to the annual Pet Expo at the Caulfield Race Course to be admired, by all pet lovers, as a fine example of my breed. Thank goodness, this year was not as hot as last, and I enjoyed meeting lots of people to show them how easy it is to love a dog like me!
Sometimes in the shop, I get to see items that really do need some explaining! One of my very, very favourite pieces at present is this lovely oval wooden box. I believe it is burr walnut, and when opened it has two layers, with little round holes, two smaller than all the others, It’s ticket describes as an early 19th century cigar humidor, to be handled with great care!
We do not know when it was first grown, or smoked, but we can be pretty certain that the inhabitants of Europe were unaware of tobacco until after Columbus’s epic voyage of 1492. Two of his sailors reported that the Cuban Indians smoked a primitive form of cigar, with twisted, dried tobacco leaves rolled in other leaves such as palm or plantain. In due course, Spanish and other European sailors caught the habit, and smoking spread to Spain and Portugal and eventually France, most probably through Jean Nicot, the French ambassador to Portugal, who gave his name to nicotine. Later, the habit spread to Italy and, after Sir Walter Raleigh's voyages to America, to Britain.
 Tobacco consumption in England was generally limited to snuff until the beginning of the 19th century when cigars were brought back from Spain by the military. Their use was limited by high import duties until 1830, but after this date the production of humidor and small cigar and cheroot cases expanded rapidly with the variety of humidor ranging from traditional English boxes of mahogany and brass to very decorative French chests of veneers with inlaid decoration.
Production of "segars” as they were known, began in Britain in 1820, and in 1821 an Act of Parliament was needed to set out regulations governing their production. Because of an import tax, foreign cigar humidor in Britain was already regarded as a luxury item.
Soon there was a demand for higher quality cigars in Europe, and Spanish cigars were superseded by those made in Cuba, which was then a Spanish colony, where cigar humidor production had started during the mid-18th century. Cigars, smokers discovered, travelled better than tobacco.
It seems unimaginable with smoking now recognised as being a social misdemeanor, that on average, in Britain they spend £460 million on cigars every year and smoke about 1,072 million cigars annually? Most British cigar smokers are men, aged between 35-44, and smoke less than once a month.
Also photographed is a lovely late 19th century electroplated humidor, also one of my favorite items…
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