The red Air Knight airplane pedal car was the cutest. It led a row of two other pint-sized vehicles masquerading as barber chairs at the auction house. Behind it were a blue chopper and a red fire truck. They obviously were the stars of this specialty auction.
The auction staff had set up a self-contained barbershop in a wide corner near the door. This colorful shop of red, yellows and blues had been designed specifically for children, from its chairs down to the huge yellow plastic playground tube for the little ones to crawl into and slide through. Against a wall were two game machines and in a corner was a board with stars to hang their coats.
Dividing the space were six contiguous barber stations with star-shaped mirrors framed in blue. On either side were three barber chairs. At the front of one row was the only one that resembled a grown-up barber chair, and it looked so out of place among the whimsical pink convertible motorcar and green dune buggy in back of it.
The only thing missing were the children seated in the chairs (what child could sit still in these toys!), the barbers and their razors, and mothers and fathers waiting patiently or impatiently in the child-sized chairs.
According to the auctioneer, the items came from a child’s barbershop in Philadelphia. I found the former location of the shop on the web, and the property seems to have been sold. The new owners apparently have other plans for its use.
It operated out of a 1908 Dutch Colonial house, and “the atmosphere was created for children to have a delightful experience while getting their hair cut,” according to the real estate agency that sold it. There is also a video of what the shop looked like before it was dismantled.
The barbershop in its latest incarnation was a big draw for the few children at the auction house. I watched as two little girls raced around, playing at the two arcade games and then moving to the other side of the stations to fool around with something else that had caught their eye. I also saw boys touching and examining the remnants.
Later, as I stood watching an auction in progress, a loud crash rang out from the corner. Something had fallen, and the sound stilled the house as we all imagined what it could be. I’m sure others had seen children playing among the pieces, and we were all sure that one of them had accidentally toppled something.
The auctioneer/owner was in the middle of a sale, stopped and called out to parents to keep an eye on their children and warned that parents would be responsible for any damage. I walked over to the area and saw that one of two tall yellow cabinets had fallen to the floor. Fortunately, no one was hurt.
About 25 gathered in the area once the auction began for the barbershop items. The auctioneer noted that his staff had disassembled the shop and re-assembled it. “It’s easy to come apart and assemble,” he said, hoping to allay any fears that this was a bear to put together.
He also noted that he’d sell the pieces individually and then offer the whole thing as a set. If it sold as a set, the individual bids would be invalid.
So the auction began, with some of the furniture going for very little: table & stool, $5; five folding chairs, $3 each; four tall wall slats, $2 each; coat rack, $5; step stool, $12.50. The two tall cabinets – including the one still lying on the floor – went for $5.
Some of those items would work well in a school classroom or a day care center.
Bidding on the barber stations was slack, so much so that the auctioneer suggested that the mirrors could be removed and sold separately. Even that didn’t budge the bidding: The stations sold for only $10 each. Auction-goers probably couldn’t figure out how to get them out of there and what to do with them when they did.
Here are some of the other prices (minus the 15 percent buyer’s premium):
Red Air Knight airplane chair, $300.
Blue chopper chair, $220.
Red fire truck chair, $150.
Pink motorcar chair, $100.
It came with a little wheel in the back that had become un-attached.
Yellow playground tube/set, $80.
Green dune buggy, $60.
Red traditional barber chair (which came with four black cushions), $60.
Two arcade games, $30 each.
The auctioneer noted that the games in the machine belonged to one of his staffers and that they were not part of the sale.
At the end of the auction, the entire set was offered for a starting bid of $1,200, but no one took the bite. With no takers, the individual bidders got to take their bounty home.
Passing the barbershop set later, I saw that only one chair had been removed by the new owner. The airplane was gone.
