Hawken School, Gates Mills, Ohio, Part I

A private school near here has had an antiques show as a fundraiser each of the past 22 years. Dozens of the high school students and parents volunteer to sell tickets, serve food, park cars, etc., but the show is run by a professional show manager. It has grown from a very “country-oriented” show held outside to a sophisticated antiques show with formal and informal antiques. We did notice that the country furniture, wicker, white-painted wooden pieces and Windsor chairs sold quickly, while the more expensive formal English pieces were not moving.

We always find something we weren’t looking for. That’s part of the fun. One booth had blue glass candlesticks on a table, very showy. Another surprise was a group of silver-plated loving cups from camps and schools. They were 6 to 10 inches tall and engraved with the names of awards and winners. Price: $150 to $200. A jewelry dealer had bracelets made of strings of buttons or Bakelite mahjong tiles at $200. Colorful plastic buckles were $5 to $30. Old silver handles from knives were fitted to stainless steel pasta-serving tops, making a new-old utensil. For the first time in many shows, we saw a booth filled with Danish Christmas plates from various years. They were selling. We also found a booth filled with old seed packets and bought some to send with greeting cards.

For many years we have admired a booth of very expensive majolica. Most expensive this year was a George Jones quail game dish that was on the cover of a 1989 book about majolica. It sold for $57,500 at a January 2006 auction and was offered here for $64,000. We have wanted a Palissy-type plate with 3D snakes and lizards for many years, probably because the one in our family went to another person. But we didn’t want one enough to pay thousands of dollars, which is the going rate today. So we were delighted to find a small Palissy dish, 4 1/2 inches in diameter, that was within our budget. It is now in the library above our computer, where we see it every day.

to be continued…