202. Why Antiques Matter with Johanna McBrien

ago at this point. I know Jerry Ward put that, uh put that a book together and I gave a little presentation actually a Lanley boardman who was one of the cabinet makers whom I wrote for the book, and he was also one of my thesis, the focus of my thesis with Samuel Dock when they're both cabinet makers enforcement and the I had actually discovered where he trained and who put whom he trained.

support Smith furniture. And you know, I loved those little drop apron you know, paneled both front chests and you know with the beautiful satin wood and you know match Mahogany veneers and all that, and does that still exist there's you know, I mean, I know things are selling for a fraction, but there's still people that want this type of furniture.

to publish material. And so I was very in tuned, you know, with with who was buying and whatnot at

that point. And I've been here at Denna Museum and Archive in Dena, mass for seven years this June actually, and so I'm not I don't go to the auctions like I used to, but I still do go I still do attend antique shows and there's certainly still course with furniture that I do find, you know, when I go through the antique shows, particularly the New Hampshire and TSE Dealer Show and the Manchester New Hampshire Shows and the other shows that are up there. Deerfield et cetera.

So it's definitely still out there. There's definitely interest. People say there's no interest in brownwood anymore. I don't. I don't agree with that. I think that's just been a market adjustment because things have gotten so high in price that they the average person couldn't afford it.

add little accents with smalls and people. There was a for a long time, a big push with modernism, and that's now not as big as it was. For a while. You know, the gray and the black and the white and everything sleek and whatnot. Then there became more interest

in this was the term. It's basically maximalism instead of minimalism, and so you know, lots of textures and colors and you know, patterns in a space, and oftentimes there'll be like an accent piece of a one nice really nice piece and then smalls you know associated that because again you first of all, it's a living comfortable the comfortable living aesthetic that I think is also changed. Most people

don't live in formal houses like museum houses anymore. They don't live in a formal side dining room for example, the side or laid out. That's why silver isn't as popular as it used to be, because people don't do that anymore. China, forget about it. I mean, people just can't give it away. You know that from I'm sure from you know, being the auctions, because people don't have these multi course meals anymore. So culture is changing, and as culture changes, the interests as far as what people

want to live with. And again, living in a formal setting isn't what many people feel is comfortable. So that's why this this shift towards more and also and then you have the modernism, which is again cool and whatnot. It's still you still see in the designer decorated books. It's still chic, but the comfort aspect of the of the textiles and the patterns and the and the stuff

is also now a part of it. And again I think the accents play large part, especially with people who are who are not able to spend a thousand or more on something. Even though an accent piece can be a small can be that much too. And when I go to a show, I tend to buy buy things. In fact, I saw Clayton Pennington of Manti Digestive last year at the New Hampshire and Tip Show and he and Lada No, it was actually in New York and January. I hadn't been in there five years, but I decide, okay,

so that should go down. And I saw Clayton and Leda Lida Salls Colin. She's amazing, she's in her nineties, God bless her. And they were like, oh, we should do an article on you. And you know, you know what's you collect. It's like I wouldn't say I'm a collector, certainly. I I just it's things that I enjoy. So it's

nothing even't expensive at all, trust me. But there are things that I enjoy it like smalls And when I go to the antique shows show I can afford things that I'll buy things that are just small, you know, like a little a little miniature bench or you know, silver, a pewter shoe or just entiniable things that are just from little accents because they make me happy. And that's I think the important thing is is you want to look at something and you want to make you happy.

And you should never buy for investment, you know, That's right, that's like buying one oh one. Do not buy for investment, as you guilt. You know what's going to happen in the market, you don't know how interest are going to change, and so buy what you love, what.

people are doing more too. They're meshing time periods as long as the design works, it doesn't matter when it was made. So that's why you have fun when you collect. You know, you can buy from different time periods as long as they work together. Have fun with it. You know, you don't have to follow this this guide of you know what am I collecting? Am I doing it the right way? Follow your gut, follow your heart, and if it's something sings to you, then bam. You know that's

the way to go. And if I could collect anything seriously, if I win the lottery, I certainly will. It would be actually Salem in Massachusetts from the seventeen seventies ish time period, because you have that Newport gracefulman, but it's even better, and the wood is so dense and heavy and beautiful mahogany, and there's just that gorgeous line that Hogarth curve, you know, and the and the and the carving of the I mean the shaping of uh no, no, no McIntyre.

Women's fashion for example, you know they they cycle back around, you know, the hemlines or whatever it is, even men's ties, you know, the thin the thing that's I mean just just nothing's new. It just kind of gets added on. What is I think Steve Jobs, although he was not the first one to say this, basically said, you know how he came. You know why he was successful is he took other people's ideas and made them better.

for a while. I remember I I didn't know what I was going to do when that first happened. I knew I couldn't do appraisals anymore. I couldn't, you know, be involved in auctions anymore for a while. But I did a very interesting podcast with three different auction companies during the pandemic, and I remember Wes. I'm trying to think of Wes, and yes, Wes Cowen said a collector has to collect, they'll figure it out. And I really thought that was really a great saying because they did.

I mean, look at the group shops when they started opening up. They were flooded with people buying. You know, everyone that I knew that owned a group shop was doing really well. Eventually auctions came back, and what I thought was going to happen was I thought it would be like a dam breaking, like they'd be so much flooded into the market, and it kind of happened that

it would change everything. I look at my friend John McGinnis, for instance, and he's still backed up, you know, like a year a worth of merchandise here and there and all over the place, ready to sell all the time. So we're kind of force feeding. I had a conversation with John, I don't know, not that long ago, and he said, buyers, buyers is what I need. I need buyers get me buyers, not sellers. So right, right right, I mean, but we made it through the pandemic. We're

still going things. It depends on what it is. Some things seem to be holding really well. Some things, you know, it's a hit or miss. I think you could have something in three different auctions and get three different extremes. I mean, these things are possible.

And then you have other things like the Scrimshaw issues, you know, the which have unfortunately impacted, you know, antis dealers and collectors. I mean, think of people who.

done today, being poached and killed for their testimony. That's yes, of course they back then as well, but it's it's you can't put them in the same basket. And of course we want bills that save the elephants and that prevent you know, poaching and and all these horrible things that are happening now. But it doesn't mean you punish the artifacts and the history. And there's a great miniature portrait miniature sorry, somebody's rimming bell of John Ravage by

John Ravage, I believe, of George Washington on Ivory. So you can destroy that because it's on Ivory. I mean, seriously, it's it's part of history. It's just crazy.

you buy what you love and don't buy for investment. Yeah, so you live with it and you appreciate it, and you love what you have and don't plan to you know, I'll sell this is going to be my retirement fund, and I'll sell it, you know, twenty years down the road, because you never know what's what the interests are going to be, or what the laws are going to be, you know, for for so that's why it's really critical

to have that your heart sing. And if your heart doesn't sing when you see things, and you shouldn't be collecting. But as you pointed out, with the pandemic, true collectors, they're always looking for you know, it's it's a it's a it's a it's a need, it's a it's a session, it's a per session. And when I worked with Wayne Pride Antiques, this is back early in the nineties, No, mid nineties, I can't remember at this point, yeah, late nineties, and he was a consummate. He couldn't He just had

to sell things. He couldn't hold on to anything. He didn't want to. He first of all, he didn't want to deny his clients, his best clients. The best stop by holding himself. He loves selling things, so he I remember one story he told me. He was He was sitting back in his chair over his desk, his feet up on the desk, saying, Hey, Johanna, I finally got this chair back. I said, when I was he said, when I was twelve years old, I sold this Windsor chair.

Is the best windsor I had ever seen. And his specialty was Windsor's in antack of baskets blocked on chest, you know, my Cahoun paintings, et cetera. And he said, this is the best Windsor chair. And I promised myself, if I ever got it back, this is the one thing I would keep. The next day he was sold. Couldn't he couldn't sell. He could have not sell. So

that was his passion. He loved collecting, so you know, and sell and selling, and you know he had he had the collectors loved to love to collect, and so it was that's what that's what you know, that's why people go into the business. They love the material and they love to love to sell, and you know, place place things in the right places, right locations.

in a bag and put everything in a bag. So we had all these you know, like I don't know how many drawers there were. There was like fifty sixty drawers, maybe even more.

it before, and you know, is the same way. And he really knew his stuff and he was a really actually most people don't realize that he was very giving, caring, funny, uh, generous person, you know to those who you know worked with him, and you know if he didn't show that, you know, publicly in the same way. So but he did. He had a great sense of humor.

and you know, I mean, it's just amazing. And I remember your cousin Alan Breed told me when he was making that copy that there were some things he just couldn't understand how they could have done with the tools they had at the time. You know, there were all these little trick things and you know that trick doors are something that you know, he just said, it was just the watches underneath.

blah blah blah. But they were they weren't just you know there. In fact, Alan he uh, I'm writing a conversation with him once where he had a several let's say, six uh Portsmouth games chair type crest to carve to recreate, and he said the first one, you know, took he just took a bit for him to kind of get into the groove. But then you know, once he started moving along, he just knocked them out, you know, because you got into a rhythm and you again, you were

on the clock. You wanted to make money. So even though yes, these things still survive, and yes it's amazing and how some of them were made, but they were you know, they weren't like being ar teeths. They were they were doing the job and that had to be done. And but there was craftsmanship, you know, versus just you know, whipping it together and and you know, rid of here out of the next one. There was definitely a craft that ship involved. As it was your reputation too, you

want that. I was actually, there's a there's a lost art books. I think it is not to plug somebody's business, but he just re or just just reproduced h French seventeenth or eighteen eighteenth century books on tools and workmanship. And if I was still in that field in the same way, I would buy it in a heartbeat, because it's it's it's been translated also, so it's not in the original obviously the original French version. But at that

I mean I look at my bookcase. I mean in my bookcase is at home, and that's right, that's where you know, I put the so much focuses collecting these great books of the years.

where he lived. His name is John Thurston. There was a pulpit and carvings that match what's on the chair, for example, And Bob Saint George Robert St. George was the first one to write about this, or an earlier person to write about this in his book, his book on the seventieth century Craft. And this is the oldest date of piece of furniture in America, so it's an extraordinary piece. It's a great chair, and they are earlier pieces made done in Plymouth, but this is the oldest

stated piece of sixteen fifty two. But you can see, you know his car. But he came over, he brought, he brought what he knew in England and you know, made the furniture in the same manner as he made in England. Then he trained another fellow who came over at a younger age at about fourteen. His name was John Houghton, and that you can see the similar similarities. We have a John Thurston, he was given the master

as they were called at the time. We have that chair, the great chair, and we have a chest that we bought actually at some other piece in twenty nineteen that's tribute to him. And then we have a matching chest, you know, with three panel carb chest that's made by the fellow, his apprentice whom he trained here, John Houghton, that was actually owned by the Fairbanks family and the Fairbanks house here in Denham is the oldest timber frame

house in North America. It's extraordinary, so not just much to the US, US and Canada. And then he Houghton also made again the Apprentice, also made a matching or a great chair that has the same laws engine, the back panel which is the diamond shaped, similar shaped crest, et cetera, et cetera, and the three panel chests are almost identical even the way they're made, with the with the interlacing bottom boards. And so as far as I know, we're the only museum that has from the seventieth century

matching Master Apprentice forms. It's really very cool. But the point is, yeah, it was right. And Thurston who was again the Master, also was one of the builders of the Fairbanks House and he also built the first school and meeting house. And Denham is the first community in the colonies lease in England to where the public voted for a tax supported public school. So that's very cool in the sixteen forties. But anyway, so he was very

involved in the town. But the point being back to your question, he came over from England and we can trace exactly you know where he we know where he lived. But then with then within ten miles, there's this carving that matches what's on the chair, and so that's that's that's the fastest way that the styles would get you know, introduced, and not just in the seventeenth century. That continues, you know,

through the eighteenth century, et cetera. On. But again, once you get the pattern books like the Happo Whites and Shared Heppo White, Charity's pattern Books, Charity and Happle Whites books, that's also you know, that's where you get more of a extended similarities because they're following. Chippendale's book wasn't as in earlier in the eighteenth century, it wasn't as distributed as widely, and there are other pattern books as well. This was not the only one. Chipendale was not the

only one in eighteenth century. Well, but you also you also have cabinet makers producing their own books and their own price thing and whatnot. Winter Tour has some examples of that.

side of it. And then when I was at Christie's I'd hang out with Alan Miller, the cabinet maker, and just you know, he'd show me about tool marks and we talk about you know, all sorts of things that we'd see there. So uh, I mean you have to ask. You need mentors, you know, going through life, whatever you whatever you do, having people that you can trust and that want to teach you and that are and want

to share so that others learn. I mean there's some people that are like, oh, no, I'm not going to tell you anything. That's right.

it's appreciating. But again it's that knowledge and uh, you know, having people who really know what they're looking at it. Yeah, yeah, I hope you hope it continues.

even know the answer to this question. But you think of like an American eighteenth century cabinet maker that had his own, you know, design, And I think of Duncan Fife for instance, And I wonder if Duncan Fife ever influenced anyone in England to you know, design like him, because you do see the well a lot of times they're they're you know, George the third uh they call him, you know, a double pedestal bait tables that do have

a similarity to Duncan Fife's design. But but I don't know, I don't know if that ever went that.

time that's a little later than my specialty. And it's also in New York, which again isn't mine Wick but uh yeah, I mean the whole transfer and sharing of information and people. I actually taught a class out the Rizzy Road Doland School of Design years ago and I was I was Cheryl Robertson who was teaching the class would take me sabbatical chase, but I go in for her. So it was a history for Ensure class. And so

you start with the Egypt Police. That's where I started and went you know to today and a lot to cover, no question, and uh these were these these students again no offense to students whosy, but uh, they had an attitude. It was a required course and they they felt that they knew everything and they just wanted to but they wanted to make And so as I do, las to teach also at the Boston Architicial Center which is now the Boston College, and that was different. Those were people

who wanted to take the class. It was, you know, after ed whatever that's called actor, you know, continuing it, and so they wanted to be there. So it was a quite different. But I mean, so i'd go around, I'd ask you know what, what what are your interests? What do you want to get out of the class, blah blah, and they were all like, you know, they have the hats halfway down and uh, I said, well, I only care you want one kid said a students said, well,

I only care about, you know, contemporary stuff. I said, well, we're getting to monitoring contemporary the last two classes, and before that you'll get an be able to see the context of where that came from, it that or center. He's like, well, I don't care about modern contemporary. And I said, well, those are the last two class and I kind of repeated myself and he said and he said to me, well, then those are the only classes

I'm going to come to. And I said, and I said, then you're going to fail the course next But it was that attitude of I don't need to know anything else, which is total. I mean, I hope learned since then that context within anything, regardless of what you're talking about, is critical to understanding and if you're going to look at again design, what came before it. It's like anything. It's like history. You know, history, you know, repeats itself. Whether you want to accept that or not, it does.

I'm the same exactly ways, but the same concepts, and so do design and so yeah, I mean everybody is sharing from everybody else, well, learning from everybody else and interpreting in their own putting their own swing on it. That's why even somebody who comes from England in the seventeenth century, you know, who makes this piece of furniture, He's going to introduce something locally, you know, the local

craftsman is oh I saw. Because creative people they're always looking, you know, they're creative, and so they're always looking for new inspiration and the nature nature or you know what a competitors doing.

and I do have some fear of that. But I also I heard someone's perspective on why there's a little bit of separation and the way it used to be, and I think there's a lot of truth to it. And I'm just going to run it by you what this person told me. He basically used a Limos chocolate set. Let's just say, you know, it became in the seventies and eighties, all of a sudden, it became collectible and costly.

But the reason it became collectible is because the person at the time remembered their grandmother serving them hot cocoa through this chocolate set. And now it's put in a cabinet, it's you know, it's expensive, you can't touch it, and so it loses that connection, the family connection and the ephemeral connection at the time when you're a child to look back to. So now the old saying, if it loses its story, it loses its value, you know, that type of thing. So so what do you think about that?

I mean, do you think. And we also were in a place right now we click on something used to be where you had all these stories. I still have stories. I go to Facebook marketplace. I got this Spanish circle of old Master painting, you know, through Facebook. Terrible frame, I know, but anyway, so but I love the chase, and I think that's gone a lot when all you have to do is click on something and you're not, you know, running it down.

through the museum every spring. That's pretty soon and one of the one of the sessions we have we have three different stations, and one of which is which is when I run. It's it's the then and now, and it's giving them opportunity to handle. Uh, you know, original material, even if it's the nineteen sixties. You know telephone dialogue, you know, wrot telephone. Uh. And I make the connection with the phone, and we start with the candlestick phone.

We kind of work up and then with a start with a oh, I'm blank on the name of this stereograph.

several cannibals. I talk about candle making and you know spoons that you know somebody obviously card on our own. The other one they bought from you know, a store from the you know, nineteenth or the twentieth century, and just talking about the process and how long things took. You couldn't just run this, you know a store and buy something you had to you know, you barred for, you made it, you you know whatever. And again it's that that patience and appreciation that things took time, they

weren't instant and instantaneous. And that is something I think it's important to remind students about because they they don't know because everything is so instant. Wow, I want to ask I want something, to run to the store and get it, or I want order.

dropping the sink. But I think I think things as you say that the stories are what make an object important, even though, if you're going to go back to the auctions or dealers, you know, if you're just because George Washington sat in a chair doesn't make it a great looking chair. It could still be an ugly chair. And so just because you have that provenance doesn't mean it's going to sell for a lot of money. But it's nice story, So there's still a story connected to it,

even if it's not worth a lot of money. So it doesn't have to work a lot of money to have a story. It can be a little trinket. I can have a fun story about my grandmother or grandfather or a cousin whatever, a golant uh you know, brought this from X y Z time or they made this or they played with this or whatever. It just makes it. The life is stories. That's what our lives are. That's

what a museum does. They tell stories and their their history based of course, but it's the stories of people's lives, and a lot people's lives don't really the basic needs don't the basic needs don't change, and the situations don't really change on the broad scrip of things. But it's again those stories and what they you know, how their life was when you know, within the automobiles or whatever happens to be. I mean, uh, it's those stories that

make make history so so interesting. It's so much fun and so relevant to our lives, you know today. And that's why if you're going to do history, you've got to be a storyteller. If you're gonna do if you're gonna sell you know, antiques, it's being a storyteller adds a lot to it. And it's like it's, you know, we all want to sit and listen to a good storyteller.

And then so this woman came up to me and she says, there's a woman standing back in the back of the line, but I want to bring her right up to you because she has an eagle that belonged to George Washington. And so I'm kind of like chuckling, and I said, okay, all right. So so she comes, they bring up to the front of the line, and she unwraps this thing very carefully whatever and she puts out the most beautiful bellamy two foot eagle you could imagine. And I said, well, I got good news and bad

news for you. I said, first of all, George Washington was dead for about one hundred and fifty years when this thing was carved. And but it was her family history, you know, you know how that can happen, like it came down through like George Washington might have stayed at their house one time or in their family or something whatever. But anyway, I said, you still have a very valuable eagle made in Kittery Point, Maine. And you know, I

mean it was just it was really funny. But you hear these I love the stories, even though they're wrong. Here when people have these.

can check back on this podcast. I did a podcast about that carver. I'm trying to remember the gentleman that put the book together. Oh yes, I just can't think of I can't. But anyway, Jim, Jim, there was.

not learning the history that they should be learning. And so therefore, if you're not learning something, how can you be aware of it? So and it's like anything cultural, be it, you know, museums, symphony, ballet. If you're not being exposed to it, you're not going to know, and therefore you're not going to care. And that is a very serious issue with culture in general. If you don't know, then you're not going to care. So that's that's a that's why I love having you know, school kids come

in here, you get you you like that sparking. You never know what it is that you're going to like that spark if they go to an option, you know, whatever it is something you they need. People need to be exposed and to to history, to culture because it's important. It makes us, It makes us a richer person, you know,

having that, I mean having that exposure. So that's that's that's a really really important issue that I don't have an answer for other than figure out a way to get history back into schools and part of the curriculum. More so, younger people are exposed to it, so there is that interest. Otherwise it's just you know, they're going to fall into it. They're going to you know, some one way or the other. But it's it's more difficult,

more challenging to to get younger people aware. So that's that's something which which I'm I would love to see more more focus on.

hang on a wall by itself in space. They're usually architecture classes that they don't teach decorative our furnature classes. And I was very fortunate there was a program an artistry artistanery also at BEU at the time where John was, and he taught us one semester to semester class on the history of furniture, and the p I A kids were there too, so I got the people making the stuff and I got him talking about the stuff, and it just lit the spark. I was like, oh my gosh.

Again it was that exposure, that opportunity, and it changed my trajectory entirely to that was that that Again, it's about the opportunity and so regardless of how you find it, but the you know, the more exposure to classes or TV shows, stars or whatever, pond stars, yeah, pickers, America, pickers, whatever, they're they're important.

great thing, it really is. Yeah, I appreciate it.