
Why the bottom has dropped out of the antiques market - e15ctr0n
http://www.economist.com/news/christmas-specials/21683982-why-bottom-has-dropped-out-antiques-market-out-old
======
StevePerkins
I found it curious that the article concludes with a "social justice" angle.
Noting that antiques are more eco-friendly than manufacturing completely new
items, and wondering why this environmental point doesn't attract young
people.

For one thing, the article talks about antique furniture costing thousands or
tens of thousands of dollars. Selling that to a crowd of debt-saddled
Millennials on the basis of "social justice" is pretentious to the extreme.
After all, my organic latte is already resting atop my bamboo yoga mat... so
I've done my part.

More seriously though, I've always assumed that the antiques market is driven
by nostalgia and longing for the past. The younger generation today seems to
have very low levels of nostalgia and longing for the past. Specifically FOR
"social justice" reasons.

Please don't get me wrong, I'm not making some absurd Tumblr argument that
antique chairs are racist or anything. I'm just noting that less nostalgia for
the past probably lowers the demand for antiques, and surely that plays a role
alongside the supply rising due to Baby Boomer retirements.

~~~
a2tech
For myself nostalgia doesn't have anything to do with it. I like well built
furniture that will last the test of time and remain nice looking. Ikea and
the ilk produce throw-away furniture. Even their sturdiest/most expensive
pieces are designed to be used for a time, then discarded. I'd rather buy 1
$4000 couch that lasts my entire adult life than buying a new $500 Ikea couch
every 5 years.

~~~
adrianN
I disagree that Ikea furniture breaks after just five years. I've used an Ikea
bed for almost twenty years. It also survived moving (and was easy to
transport because you could disassemble it again). A Billy will definitely
also last longer than five years.

I can also not believe that there are sofas, for whatever price, that last a
lifetime without expensive repairs to the cushions.

~~~
syntheticnature
I have a $4k sofa, from Ethan Allen, purchased a bit over a decade ago, and
will confirm that the cushions are in dire need of restuffing, and there a
piece of plywood (sewn into cloth) underneath the cushions to compensate for
decay in the underlying supports. If mattresses basically need replacement
after a decade, similarly-constructed things will also.

~~~
mturmon
I have a $3.5K sofa, well-built with elegant fabric, that did not fit in with
my house after I moved. It now sits in an outbuilding and my dog loves it. I
got a replacement on Craigslist for $350, and I like it just as much.

My lessons: (a) buying sofas is hard; (b) for me, nothing is forever; (c) it's
hard to generalize about the wisdom of various furniture purchase strategies.

------
Spooky23
This paragraph answers the question:

> _Antique furniture went mainstream in Europe in the second half of the 19th
> century, as the bourgeoisie found themselves with more disposable income and
> developed a desire to invest in their homes. The antique trade boomed in
> Paris and London. By 1890 Paris had 300 antique shops, up from 25 around
> 1850, says Manuel Charpy, a historian. But antiques, like clothes, go in and
> out of style. They boomed again in the 1950s and 1980s, when “period rooms”
> in a single nostalgic style were all the rage._

The upwardly mobile / striver class of middle class people with money to burn
and a need to signal their social position is both smaller and made up
differently than it was before. Instead of the traditional professional
classes, we are in the age of the technician and skilled tradesman.

High-tech folk are dominated by engineers, a substantial portion of who hail
from Asia. Their collecting tastes trend toward tech toys and away from
European traditions. Skilled tradespeople are like a branch of applied
engineers. Plumbers, electricians, gear heads and HVAC people tend to buy old
cars, not 18th century furniture or silver service.

Also, people are less social than ever before, so status symbols shift. When
you look at 3000 ft^2 homes, you see lots of fancy exterior stuff, and empty
interiors. There's no stigma to owning a million dollar home and sitting on
beanbags today.

~~~
pjc50
_owning a million dollar home and sitting on beanbags today_

In central London, a million dollar home is a one-bedroom flat:
[http://www.rightmove.co.uk/new-homes-for-
sale/property-37648...](http://www.rightmove.co.uk/new-homes-for-
sale/property-37648659.html) (540ft^2)

I don't think there's _room_ for things much larger than a beanbag there.

~~~
Spooky23
That's unbelievable.

I live in a place that is basically an average US market. Here a $1M home is a
legit mansion or a serious amount of land. A two-earner 200k household can
afford a suburban 2,500-3,000 ft^2 on 0.1-0.25 acre in a development with a
good school district. Something like this:
([http://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-
detail/55-Spruce-S...](http://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-
detail/55-Spruce-St_Clifton-Park_NY_12065_M32544-67208))

~~~
pjc50
I did put a thumb on the scale by picking "central London" :) UK houses are
sold by "bedrooms" without quoting an area, so it's hard to find a directly
comparable one, but e.g. [http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-
sale/property-559752...](http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-
sale/property-55975229.html) which would be great to retire to but otherwise a
bit of an employment blackspot. That's ultimately why people live in the
expensive areas: proximity to jobs.

(Stoke-on-Trent will sell you a small terraced house for £1 on the condition
that you have £30k to fix it. It's not exactly Detroit but it has suffered
from the collapse of its traditional china plate industry.)

------
technotarek
Worlds colliding. This Economist article plus our antique and vintage focused
startup, ATTIC ([https://attic-dc.com](https://attic-dc.com)), is featured on
Cloudinary's blog today:

[http://cloudinary.com/blog/10_startups_managing_images_in_th...](http://cloudinary.com/blog/10_startups_managing_images_in_the_cloud_part_7)

The E article points out the waning demand for certain genres and increasing
demand for others. This can't be emphasized enough. Midcentury modern is what
younger furniture shoppers seem to appreciate and it's reflected in the
designs of the big box retailers like West Elm CB2. Their assessment of
younger shoppers seems a bit off too, as outlets like the Washington Post and
Apartment Therapy cite mixing old and new as one of the top 5 (!) design
trends:

[https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/home/apartment-
ther...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/home/apartment-therapys-
maxwell-ryan-shares-5-top-design-
trends/2015/10/02/e1aa9c2e-6787-11e5-9223-70cb36460919_story.html)

We also think that consumers have moved away from these goods partly out of
convenience (or lack thereof). Furniture is something you want touch (and
smell) before you buy. You want to inspect its integrity. It's a market that
doesn't lend itself to buying online, at a distance. At the same time, it's
not particularly easy to shop locally either -- furniture dealers are not
necessarily the most tech savvy and don't always have the resources for
comprehensive marketing.

That's one of the reasons we built ATTIC -- to help aggregate and showcase
local opportunities to buy antiques and vintage furniture from small
businesses. In general, shopping local -- especially from small businesses --
is a difficult proposition when it's so easy to shop online. That's a problem
that we think could use some solving.

~~~
bryanlarsen
I believe you're right -- while mid-century modern is not technically antique
because it's not quite 100 years old, I believe it is currently occupying that
niche in furniture fashion.

However, there's one major difference in this market -- many of the classic
midcentury modern designs are still being made. You can buy a brand new, fully
authentic Series 7 or Eames Lounge Chair or many of the other things on my
wife's shopping list.

And even new designs in the mid-century modern style do not have the same feel
of inauthenticity that fake antiques do. Mid-century modern has always been
mass-produced in a factory.

~~~
at-fates-hands
I came to say the same thing.

midcentury _anything_ has been going strong for at least the past decade or
more. It's not just furniture, but art, reel-to-reel recorders, record
players, nearly anything that came from the 50's is gaining traction in nearly
every niche you can think of.

The prices are starting to level out a little bit as well, making it more
affordable. There's also a TON of retro shops where I live (Minneapolis) where
you can get amazing MCM furniture. Places like
[http://findfurnish.com/](http://findfurnish.com/) where you can get a very
nice Danish Teak credenza for around $500.

And yes, I know, midcentury can be anything from the 30's on up through the
60's. It is a rather a broad category of time.

------
codingdave
Our home is filled with antiques. Not expensive ones... cheap, practical ones.
We scour the stores for old farm tools that are in good enough shape to still
use. Much of our furniture was inherited, not bought, and we can trace it back
to great-grandparents.

We didn't plan it this way. We just happen to live on a hobby farm, trying to
live sustainably, and would rather keep our old furniture for both financial
and family reasons.

Of course, this also proves the point of the article - even in a home
furnished mostly with antiques, we aren't part of a market for it. Our
antiques are functional objects in our life, not investments.

------
melling
Back in the late 90's, I was going to start an Antiques and Collectibles
website. Here's the Internet archive:

[https://web.archive.org/web/19980430125559/http://www.archon...](https://web.archive.org/web/19980430125559/http://www.archonmedia.com/antique_forum/)

20 years later and I'm more or less doing the same thing for the Swift
Language:

[http://www.h4labs.com/dev/ios/swift.html](http://www.h4labs.com/dev/ios/swift.html)

Perhaps I should have taken the time to learn some design skills.

~~~
reustle
Yeah no offense but the antiques site is much easier to navigate... :)

------
lordnacho
Might there be a shift in how we think about furniture? You used to run into
people who'd have stuff that was passed down the generations, and not just in
wealthy homes. It seems to have been a necessity for poor young couples, and a
lot of old stuff seems to have been hand crafted.

Nowadays, you can change every piece of furniture in the house for a few
hundred bucks. There's constantly something new at IKEA, and you don't want to
care if the kid scratches your dining table. You also want it to be easy to
clean, and if you're moving house you can just throw out the old stuff.

~~~
pjc50
There's a change in how people think about furniture, driven by high real
estate prices. A grand piano costs more in floor area in major cities than it
actually does to buy.

It's also clearly very fashion-driven. Wait until everyone's gone IKEA
modernist, and you'll see the pendulum start to swing back again.

~~~
technotarek
Yeah, I agree with your pendulum. I noted a WaPo article above that is hinting
at that swing citing the mixing of old and new as a rising trend:

[https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/home/apartment-
ther...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/home/apartment-therapys-
maxwell-ryan-shares-5-top-design-
trends/2015/10/02/e1aa9c2e-6787-11e5-9223-70cb36460919_story.html)

Plus, if you look at some of the most sought after stuff -- e.g.,
Anthropologie furniture -- it's all throw back to old era. It seems to be as
much about the ways in which people shop (online vs at brick and mortar) as it
is purely about changes in taste.

------
lintiness
i take umbrage:

"Television programmes such as “Antiques Roadshow”, where octogenarians find
out how much the contents of their attics are worth, reinforce the perception
that antiques are for oldies."

to the contrary. i'm 40 - octogenarian around here - and the show has done
nothing but increase my interest in old "things".

~~~
lazyant
yes, a lot of articles explaining why something happened just try and fit a
narrative, any narrative.

------
mikeleung
interesting the antiques market is doing so poorly while the vintage watch
market is on the up and up.

Recent record breaking sale of an omega speedmaster:

[https://www.hodinkee.com/articles/omega-speedmaster-
referenc...](https://www.hodinkee.com/articles/omega-speedmaster-
reference-2915-1-sells-for-xxxxx-at-christies-in-new-york)

And it wasn't even one that's been on the moon like this one:

[https://www.hodinkee.com/articles/moon-watch-sells-
for-$1mil...](https://www.hodinkee.com/articles/moon-watch-sells-
for-$1million)

~~~
fredoralive
The article implies jewellery is doing well (or at least better) in the second
paragraph, and I'd suspect that high end watches would follow that a bit more
than furniture. Things you can show off more easily still selling well?

~~~
lintiness
collectible jewelry is viewed a lot like currency; it's small and
transportable. given political upheaval, would you rather carry a wardrobe or
a ring?

~~~
analytically
try selling a ring in a poor area, people don't care anymore

~~~
knughit
You can visit a nearby richer aree to sell a ring.

------
noir_lord
Last few places I've lived I decorated my place by getting furniture from
charity shops (what I think Americans call Thrift stores) and then stripping
and repainting them all to match.

The really good pieces could be disassembled and reassembled (with basic
tools) and when done looked like new.

Since the resurgence of the "distressed" look it's getting harder and harder
to find good stuff since the market has exploded.

I think when I have the time I'll just borrow my friends workshop and build
all my furniture for the current place since I'm mostly running with IKEA
style stuff at the moment.

------
douche
If you figure out when leases are up in your area, you can pick up a lot of
nice antique furniture for free. Often, people will be so happy to see you
take it, so they don't have to pay to get it disposed of.

