Most of the auction houses I visit usually have lovely vintage and antique furniture, some of better quality than others. Two of them have the stuff stacked on top of each other so tightly and so closely that you have to turn sideways to walk down a narrow space to examine it.
It always reminds me of my trip to Italy some years ago when we wound our way through the dark cavernous Catacombs of Rome. The auction houses are not as bleak or foreboding, but maneuvering through the furniture can be an experience. It’s worth the obstacle course, though, just to see furniture with inlaid designs or marvelously carved woodwork. At one particular auction house, the stuff is also stacked to the ceiling on an outside ramp that seems to stretch almost the length of a basketball court.
That’s where I found myself looking one day recently when I rounded the corner and was instantly face to face with the toughest looking butcher block table I had ever seen. Sitting there, it looked like it weighed a ton. I have a small quaint table at home with a wooden butcher block top, and yellow legs and shelves (which I painted). It was no match, though, for this huge baby.
The top had blackened from use and age – and would require a tremendous scrub-down (one website noted that they are more sanitary than plastic cutting boards) – but it still had its charm. Its four legs were still intact, too. It was about three feet tall, three feet deep and twice as wide.
Where the heck had it lived its life, I wondered. In a restaurant? An old butcher shop? Idling in someone’s garage?
I couldn’t imagine it in my home because my narrow galley kitchen and 1920s-built house would groan from the weight of it. It could easily become an island in a large open and airy kitchen with a few choice auction-house stools to accentuate it. Or it could be pushed up against a kitchen wall to display a collection of vintage red-handled kitchen utensils or blue and/or gray tin coffeepots and basins. Or it could be the canvas for a beautiful still-life bouquet of flowers or fruit in a lovely vase.
You could use it just about any way you wanted, but first, you’d have to get it home. On the day of the auction, I was curious about how popular it would be with the bidders, most of whom were dealers who come here specifically for the furniture sale. It had wowed me. Would it wow others?
I watched as five auction-house workers moved the table to the front of the ramp where the bidders had congregated. “It’s one of the nicest I’ve had in here,” the auctioneer said to get the bidding started and keep it going high and higher.
He didn’t have to wait long for it to take off – first past $100, then $200, then $300 and not stopping until it ended at $525. What a buy! I found some other lovely old butcher block tables on the web, many selling for twice that price and more. One site was selling vintage tops for more than that.
