The bright green discs were the first thing I saw on the items as I entered the furniture room at the auction house. None of them had just one sticker, most had two or three – indicating that these were prized items that some dealers knew would pull in the big bucks. Or they could have been homeowners looking for that right piece.
Intrigued, I obviously slowed my pace to see what all the fuss was about. I couldn’t get too close because the auction house had roped off the area. I could not see the names of the makers on any of the items.
The first group of stickers were for phone bids on a wall clock with beautifully carved and raised signs of the zodiac in a circle around the face. Inside were brass weights and a pendulum with their own flourish of designs. The cylindrical clock had roman-numeral letters on its dial.
Next, I spotted another clock, ornately carved with a top that looked like a crown, and bearing one green sticker more than the wall clock.
My eyes then rested on a secretary bookcase or desk that was just beautiful. It resembled a Louis XVI design. Its glass front held green discs from two bidders.
As soon as I left this area, I was accosted by two other items that had drawn equally or even more attention. The most lovely was a simply elegant Windsor chair and bench. The pair had attracted four phone bids (two, interestingly, were the same number). Looking at the chairs, I understood their appeal. These are chairs that have remained as classic as they were when they first appeared in England in the 1700s and found their way to this country – in Philadelphia, to start – a few decades later. Here, American furniture makers put their own mark on them.
Over the years, the chairs have been restyled by some of the best designers (George Nakashima was one of them) to being mass-produced for your local Crate and Barrel or West Elm.
Finally at the auction house, a gold-leaf tiger held up a glass-topped coffee table in a seating arrangement nearby. This table was even more intriguing. The animal figure – seated in the center of the wooden bottom – seemed to be part of the support for the top. Different, indeed. It had enticed two phone bidders.
The phone bidders apparently had seen each of these items on the auction-house website and had registered to bid on the items once the furniture sale started that afternoon. I didn’t hang around for that sale, so I’m not sure how much each of the items sold for.
