Vintiquing in .......... St Petersburg, Florida

This is the first of an occasional series of articles on “Vintiquing in...”. I was surprised that some people did not understand the term and for those who still don’t, it is the practice of looking for and visiting antique, vintage and collectable shops, markets or centres. This is probably not new but it is the first time I have done it and I hope you will let me share my thoughts on the places I have visited so you can check them out as well. If you do, please mention that you read about the place on my blog.

There are few places in this world that I fall in love with but two hold very dear memories for me and my family. One is Malta, the other is the United States of America. In particular New York City and the Gulf coast of Florida. On a recent trip for Thanksgiving this year and with a day to myself, I decided to check out two areas in and around the St Petersburg area of Florida. The first is the central avenue area of Saint Petersburg and secondly a lovely place in Largo.

The first thing I must say, is when vintiquing in Florida there is an amazing newspaper publication printed by Speciality General Services Publications Inc. The newspaper is called “Antique Shoppe” and covers most if not all of Florida. It is printed on a monthly basis and for my part is a very informative publication. You can find more details on their website, www.antiqueshoppefl.com. You will find this free publication in most antique and collectables store that have adverts in the paper. 

So back to the vintiquing, The Grand Central Avenue area is one that is being regenerated, some of the properties look decidedly run down and tired along Central Avenue, as you approach 4th down to 1st street. Clearly this area has lacked some of the opulence it once had. I think the saddest thing of all is the Ponce de Leon Hotel. From the outside it looks tired and run down and yet it is a thriving 3 star boutique hotel dating back to the 1920’s, with a 4.7 star trip advisor rating. It is not a place I have visited although I have driven past it many times in the nine years I have visited the St Petersburg area. 

Grand Central Avenue, St Petersburg

The shops I visited are all in the same block between 25th and 26th street on Central avenue. There are four in a line and one directly across the street. Unfortunately, it would appear that antique shops don’t open much before 11am in that area. Even then two of the five I could visited didn’t open even at 11am, so they got missed out on this trip. The shops visited were Janet’s Antiques (Home of the price fairy) www.thepricefairy.com, Refound Antiques and Buster’s Antiques (www.bustersantiques.com). As I said the two shops between Janet’s and Refound, were closed but were Lion’s Paw and Miss Pittypat’s Porch.

Janet’s Antiques is a 5500 sq foot emporium and is home to over 20 dealers. This a great little rabbit warren of various size rooms, some resembling walk in closets but all beautifully stocked with a wide variety of jewellery, die cast toys, apparel, ephemera, furniture and china. It is what vintiquing is all about, there is something for all the family. The staff were very inviting and pleasant and on a previous visit my daughter had purchased a number of vintage hats. 

Home of the Price Fairy

Refound antiques is a smaller shop straight front to back, although not having its own website, it does have a very proactive facebook profile, Tawny Ultch the owner is very well liked, reading some of the reviews. On the  day I visited, it was naturally quiet as were all the shops but it was only around 11am and a Wednesday. The shop has lots of Jewellery and Silver, some furniture, china and glassware. Whoever was in the shop that day, seemed very quiet and prepared to let potential customers look without any assistance, although appear pleasant, when I asked if I could take one of the shop cards. 

Refound Antiques

Buster’s Antiques was the smallest shop of the day that I visited. Only recently opened by owner Keith Gilbert and named after his dog. The shop had some furniture and quite of a lot Asian artifacts including porcelain. The focus in the shop that took my eye was the wide selection of Annie Sloan chalk paints. Now, Annie Sloan paints are very well known in the UK but it is the first time I have seen them in the US. According to Keith, they have been in the US for about five years. It seems the passion for painting dark wood furniture has migrated over the pond, as the market for dark wood furniture deteriorates, as it has in the UK. 

Buster's Antiques

There are more antique and collectable shops in St Petersburg and well worth a visit but they are more spread out and not really within easy walking distance. So in need of a coffee, I made my way out of the area and took a 30 minute drive across to and down the Alt 19 to Largo. After a coffee stop I made my next stop.

Quaint Essential is located on Walsingham Road in Largo, sitting back slightly from the road, It is exactly what it says on the roadside board. This gorgeous store is full of retro Americana, ephemera, scale models including die casts, furniture, metalware and China. The property is deceptively sized from the front, inside however there are two large rooms occupied by approximately twelve dealers.

Quaint Essential is owned and run by a lovely couple called Donna and Tom Kiehl, they were very welcoming and interested in my Etsy site and Facebook page and even offered advice on how best to enhance a photo of something I had for sale. To find out more log on to www.quaintessential.com. 

Quaint Essential Antiques

By now I was getting hungry and as it was Wednesday it was free pie day at Village Inn (www.villageinn.com). However on the way I stopped off at what was to be my final stop of the day. Park Street Antiques Center located at Bay Pines Road. This place was immense at ten thousand square feet and eighty dealers and the first Friday of every month they hold an auction at the building out the back. Clearly this antique mall has had issues with unscrupulous customers as there is a very unwelcoming sign asking you to place your bags in the lockers provided. You do get to keep the key with you so that’s not bad. If you do have loads of time to browse, it is a great place to go and particularly if you are looking for something specific because ten to one they will have it somewhere. My only issue apart from the immensity of the place, was that many of the tickets on items were face down and therefore you would have to ask to have the cabinet opened just to ask the price. Come on dealers if you want someone to get interested in your items at least have the courtesy to share the price with prospective clients. To find out more and to check future auction dates log on to www.parkstreetantiquecenter.com.

I hope you have enjoyed this article, there will be in this series throughout 2016. For now however may I wish you a peaceful remainder to 2015 and a Happy & Prosperous 2016. 

Roundtwit

For those of you waiting for my next blog post and think I have fallen off the face of the earth, fear not, it is just a matter of time. It all involves that well known collectable item that has been around for years and in some people's opinion is maybe even antique. It is called a Roundtwit. Everybody has one they just don't know where it is all the time. Some have handed down through the generations and are regarded as family heirlooms. They tend however to be specific to people and that is why you probably won't see them visible in your friends houses.
Mine at the moment is alternating between my laptop and my tablet. They appear to have a perceived almost magical quality of relocating themselves when you are not looking. I just need to make sure like today, that I use the same device that it has located itself on and then I can publish my blog because I have got Roundtwit! (or Round to it, for those still half asleep or not paying attention)

Collecting EPNS wares

Nearly everybody will have held or used something that is silver plate, cutlery, cruet sets, place mats, trays, teapots. You name it someone will have made it in silver plate. So just what is silver plate. To give it its correct title it is Electroplated Nickel Silver or EPNS. Wherever you found metalware being formed you would find EPNS ware. The two main centres for production of EPNS wares were Birmingham and Sheffield. There is a very good website relating to the makers marks for plated silver and can be found at http://www.silvercollection.eu/electroplatesilver.html Such makers as Hukin and Heath (Birmingham) and James Deakin (Sheffield) to name but two.

The process of making electroplated nickel silver is formed when a thin layer of pure or sterling silver is deposited electrolytically on the surface of a base metal. Common base metals include copper, brass, and nickel silver (an alloy of copper, zinc and nickel) also Britannia metal, which is a tin alloy with 5–10% antimony. Electroplated materials are often stamped EPNS for electroplated nickel or silver, or EPBM for electroplated Britannia metal. These should not be confused with Sheffield plate which fact was a cheaper alternative and created by a sandwich process of two sheets of nickel fused one either side of a sheet of copper. Which is why if you exceptionally house proud and want your silver plate to shine ready for when friends and neighbours come to visit after a few years of polishing you would start to see traces of the base metal starting to show through and the family silver as noted in the family journals would then be discovered to not be the silver teapot that great grandma had always claimed.

Some manufacturers cleverly made their EPNS marks to look in such a way that without a magnifier the novice collector would think they had something which was silver and upon closer inspection would find it not to be. The age old adage of all that glitters is not gold, is true in this instance. If you think you have bought yourself a bargain piece of silver look closely it may be plated. In the end buy it because you like it and then treasure it because the men who worked in the plating shops and foundries of Sheffield and Birmingham did so with little knowledge of the health and safety legislation that we have today. So it is thanks to them that you can still eat your Sunday afternoon tea with the dessert spoons your grandma left you.

The Shop Bike

Most local shops that offered deliveries to customers had that well known piece of transportation called The Shop Bike. Every unsuspecting boy that worked in the shop was called the Delivery Lad. Before the days of Health and Safety, the shopkeeper would load up as many boxed orders as they could get strung on the front and send the shop errand boy out in all weathers to deliver the goods to those who couldn't be bothered or able to carry them home. I should know, I was one of those delivery lads. In those days customer service came first not a take it or leave it attitude like there is today. So the shops that had them were typically the general store, baker or butcher.

The bicycle shown below is from around 1960 and was ridden by a recently passed neighbour of mine during the 1960's for a local butcher and when the shop closed he was given the bike. His family have very kindly given it to me. The bicycle was made by Elswick of Barton on Humber (Now Falcon Cycles). Unfortunately Falcon Cycles were not able to help that much.

It needs a bit of TLC to return it somewhere near its former glory and there are a number of vintage bicycle restoration companies who will do just that. It is just finding one close enough to home to keep the cost down. It will be restored and ridden as a tribute to not just my neighbour but all the delivery lads of the past.
Thank you for your service.

Ps: if you have enjoyed this post or any of my other posts, please let me know, it stops me thinking I am talking to myself.

I'm a little teapot - Collecting Teapots

We all know the origin of teapots, the question is why do people collect teapots? Like most collections it starts with a single item and then grows. So for example you have this plain brown earthenware teapot, it is functional, not very pretty but does the job. It is however the first teapot you bought when you moved into your flat, your gran gave it you when you left home to go to university. It starts to drip and a friend buys you a pretty one with a cup and saucer for your birthday. You start to use that one and the plain brown one sits on the shelf but you don’t want to through it out because it has memories.

You pass a comment at work that your grandma always had leaf tea and said that teabags were the sweepings from the factory. Someone then brings in a china teapot and some loose leaf tea for a cup of tea in the afternoon. That’s it you are hooked and you go and buy a china teapot at a local vintage fair. You are now unwittingly the owner of a collection of teapots. You start finding tea pots in all shapes, sizes, famous makes and patterns, novelty and commemorative, in books, magazines, shops and on TV. You know you are an avid collector when you clear space on a shelf to display your teapots, it is only going to get worse, when you have to buy a cabinet or book case because there is no room on the shelf.

Trends come and go and at the moment (and you only have to look at Ebay) the prices for Sadler teapots are very high, some reaching £350 - £500. Until recently good prices (circa £50) were paid for Royal Albert Old country Roses teapots, then everyone decided to jump on that bandwagon and the prices have fallen to between £15 – £25 approximately. Novelty teapots still can command decent prices dependent on subject matter and of course rarity.

Still that plain brown earthenware teapot is in the cupboard it’s not unloved, it’s just not as pretty as the others in your collection but it has memories and then someone on TV shows you how to grow herbs in your kitchen. All you need is a pot and they are using a plain teapot because it is decorative and looks better than a plastic plant pot in the window. Out comes the plain brown teapot and starts another stint in the kitchen.

Collectable Plates - Investment or Not?

What is it that makes people collect decorative plates? They are clearly marked in most cases “not for food use”, so what use are they? They commemorate a subject that is of particular relevance to the collector. Collectable plates come in a variety of subjects, Transport, Royalty, Literature (Brambly Hedge, Beatrix Potter) and People, to name but a few.

These plates are made by the leading porcelain and china manufacturers such as Royal Doulton, Wedgwood and Royal Worcester and then distributed by organisations such as Bradford Exchange founded in 1973 by J Roderick MacArthur. http://www.bradford.co.uk/category/11133_collector-plates.html

The plates are provided as gifts and then the collection begins. Manufactured to the highest quality and with vibrant colours they become pieces of art replacing prints or photographs on living room or hallway walls. When they are released to the market they are widely publicised via Television, Newspaper and now adverts included in social media. Dependent on the subject matter (for example the marriage of HRH Prince Charles & Lady Diana Spencer), there is a market price which is around £40 - £150, some twenty years ago this would have been between £20 and £50. They are sold as a limited edition plates, normally limited to 2000.

The sad fact is that people sometimes buy them as investments on the basis that, well they are collectable and they will gain in value. Sadly this is never the case and most collectable plates end up either in charity shops or car boot sales for pennies or at best about a fiver.

 

The reality is it doesn’t matter, the plates were bought to provide pleasure to someone and until the plates become chipped or damaged, they will continue to provide pleasure at whatever value or cost.

Please do not buy collectable plates to make a fortune, buy them for the purpose they were designed, to bring pleasure to someone.

Brambly Hedge Collectables

The ‘Brambly Hedge’ stories by Jill Barklem, first published in the early 1980's is about a community of mice living in the hedgerow and their adventures. Who would have thought this would turn out to provide not only books, TV programmes, videos and DVD's but also some of the most detailed collectables connected with the subject? The two leading manufacturers of ‘Brambly Hedge’ collectables are Royal Doulton and Border Fine Arts (which is now part of Enesco). These companies provided everything from collectable plates, individual figures to complete dioramas.

A very good book for avid collectors of Brambly Hedge items is the ‘Brambly Hedge Collectors Book’ by Louise Irvine (ISBN: 0-903685-65-5). This book is still available on Amazon and details all the collectables made, their date of introduction and withdrawal. What it doesn’t do is to detail the price, like so many of the other collectables book try to do. This will require additional research by the collector.

Items can be found in a variety of places; Antiques and Collectables Emporiums, Car Boot Sales, Flea Markets, Charity Shops, Etsy and eBay (of course). Even Facebook has the Official Brambly Hedge Page, https://www.facebook.com/pages/Brambly-Hedge-Official/131372376914506?fref=ts  which has over 5,000 likes. Obviously some pieces are rarer than others or more widely sought after. The case in point are the Border Fine Arts tableaus or dioramas, currently these are fetching between £100 and £350 dependent on the subject but typically the Doulton collectors plates can be purchased for just a few pounds.

Whatever your pocket limitation are or your desire to own these fine collectables just go and enjoy them.

Here are just some of the collectables which I have or have sold.

Who are OTN antiques?

This is by way of a welcome, my first blog you could call it and everybody has to start somewhere. 

Let me start then with an introduction, What is OTN Antiques? It is the short name for "Ooh! That's Nice Antiques & Collectables". Strange name, you may say. Well, it came about one Sunday morning when my wife and I were talking about our collection of bone china, what we should keep and what we should sell as we were running out of room.  I said it would be easier to start a business to sell it all and that "Ooh That's Nice" would make a great name for business. When asked why, I said because that's what you say when we see something at the antique fair or market that you like. The rest they say is history.

Everybody collects something and this blog will aim to explore the various items that make up a collection and also to celebrate any particular (private or professional) collection or item that I find on my travels.

I hope you will like it and follow me as we journey through the world of antiques and collectables.