Treasure hunting
So here's the story about my chair.
I’ve been addicted to Design*Sponge lately, especially the house makeovers and DIY projects. They’ve inspired me to start going to thrift stores again. Why should hipsters in Brooklyn and SF have a monopoly on finding cool stuff? Sometimes it seems like the Internet has killed thrifting-rarely does one find a hidden treasure these days. Even if something turns up in, like, a dumpster in rural Alabama, someone puts it on eBay and sells it to some design-conscious urbanite.
Nonetheless, Design*Sponge has renewed my faith and convinced me that once again, thrifting is worth my time. As luck would have it, there are a lot of thrift stores in my neighborhood, but after visiting 2 of them a few months ago I decided their furniture was overpriced. However, this weekend I checked out a different one that I hadn’t been to before, and that’s where I hit the jackpot.
Not realizing how big the furniture section was, I looked at clothes for a long time before I worked my way over to the furniture. I found a very nice skirt and a dress. Then, when I got to the furniture, I was drawn to a grouping of midcentury-looking pieces that included the chair. It was dark-finished wood with sage green vinyl upholstery, and a great modernist design--simple, clean, with nothing extraneous, just the minimum number of elements that it needed. It looked special, so I asked the woman trying out the settee near it that had similar upholstery whether she was also looking at the chair. I was willing to be a courteous shopper and ignore the chair if she was already planning to buy it; besides, at that point I didn't know the chair was anything special. But she wasn't, so I focused in on the chair. I had a nice conversation with the woman about thrifting, then when she left to look at other things I looked under it. To my delight, it had a vintage Knoll sticker! Since the chair was priced at $40, I knew this was a magical find. Sold! I had to buy it.
I told an employee and they took the chair to the back so I could pick it up after I paid for it, and stressed that I needed to get in line because the store was going to close at 1 pm. I waited in the long line, and when I got up to the register and explained that the tag I was holding was for the chair they had taken to the back, a man approached me and offered me $100 for the chair. I said “Nope!” without even considering his offer-I would much rather have the satisfaction of getting this wonderful chair for $40 and putting it in my living room. The man kept upping his offer. “I’ve been looking for this chair for years to complete my set,” he said. But I didn’t budge. He went up to $350 and offered to throw in the other chair like it that was smaller and that he was buying from the store. But I didn’t want that one, I wanted this one because it’s an armchair, which is exactly what I needed for my living room. So I kept saying no. Meanwhile, there were tons of people in line behind me, and as this was going on, people were saying, “Wow, now I want to see that chair!” and “Yeah, somebody bring it up here!” But I fended off the guy’s offers and paid for the chair and the dress and skirt. I told the saleslady and the crowd, “I look like a jerk but I don’t feel like one.” I wasn’t being a jerk, really, but I wondered if I looked like one just because I was standing my ground about the fact that I found the chair and I was going to buy it, and that was non-negotiable. I felt like a New Yorker.
When I drove around to the loading dock, another man was there with stuff he had bought-several nice chairs and the settee that the woman had been looking at. He started offering to buy my chair too, and I said “What, you too?” but he replied “That was my partner in there.” I decided that those gay dudes probably had plenty of other great furniture. They seemed like the kind of people that normally make these finds, so I refused to feel bad for them. So, I made off with my chair-the only way it fit in my car was by folding the front passenger seat back so it was laying on the back seat.
Today at work I did some research and found out even more good news. The chair was designed by Franco Albini, an important Italian architect whose work is actually in a metalwork show that I researched for the MFAH this year. It was produced between 1949 and 1967. When I told my boss all this, she was very impressed that I scored the chair. Finally, to top it all off, a cursory Internet search has suggested that it’s worth about $1,000!
I’ve been addicted to Design*Sponge lately, especially the house makeovers and DIY projects. They’ve inspired me to start going to thrift stores again. Why should hipsters in Brooklyn and SF have a monopoly on finding cool stuff? Sometimes it seems like the Internet has killed thrifting-rarely does one find a hidden treasure these days. Even if something turns up in, like, a dumpster in rural Alabama, someone puts it on eBay and sells it to some design-conscious urbanite.
Nonetheless, Design*Sponge has renewed my faith and convinced me that once again, thrifting is worth my time. As luck would have it, there are a lot of thrift stores in my neighborhood, but after visiting 2 of them a few months ago I decided their furniture was overpriced. However, this weekend I checked out a different one that I hadn’t been to before, and that’s where I hit the jackpot.
Not realizing how big the furniture section was, I looked at clothes for a long time before I worked my way over to the furniture. I found a very nice skirt and a dress. Then, when I got to the furniture, I was drawn to a grouping of midcentury-looking pieces that included the chair. It was dark-finished wood with sage green vinyl upholstery, and a great modernist design--simple, clean, with nothing extraneous, just the minimum number of elements that it needed. It looked special, so I asked the woman trying out the settee near it that had similar upholstery whether she was also looking at the chair. I was willing to be a courteous shopper and ignore the chair if she was already planning to buy it; besides, at that point I didn't know the chair was anything special. But she wasn't, so I focused in on the chair. I had a nice conversation with the woman about thrifting, then when she left to look at other things I looked under it. To my delight, it had a vintage Knoll sticker! Since the chair was priced at $40, I knew this was a magical find. Sold! I had to buy it.
I told an employee and they took the chair to the back so I could pick it up after I paid for it, and stressed that I needed to get in line because the store was going to close at 1 pm. I waited in the long line, and when I got up to the register and explained that the tag I was holding was for the chair they had taken to the back, a man approached me and offered me $100 for the chair. I said “Nope!” without even considering his offer-I would much rather have the satisfaction of getting this wonderful chair for $40 and putting it in my living room. The man kept upping his offer. “I’ve been looking for this chair for years to complete my set,” he said. But I didn’t budge. He went up to $350 and offered to throw in the other chair like it that was smaller and that he was buying from the store. But I didn’t want that one, I wanted this one because it’s an armchair, which is exactly what I needed for my living room. So I kept saying no. Meanwhile, there were tons of people in line behind me, and as this was going on, people were saying, “Wow, now I want to see that chair!” and “Yeah, somebody bring it up here!” But I fended off the guy’s offers and paid for the chair and the dress and skirt. I told the saleslady and the crowd, “I look like a jerk but I don’t feel like one.” I wasn’t being a jerk, really, but I wondered if I looked like one just because I was standing my ground about the fact that I found the chair and I was going to buy it, and that was non-negotiable. I felt like a New Yorker.
When I drove around to the loading dock, another man was there with stuff he had bought-several nice chairs and the settee that the woman had been looking at. He started offering to buy my chair too, and I said “What, you too?” but he replied “That was my partner in there.” I decided that those gay dudes probably had plenty of other great furniture. They seemed like the kind of people that normally make these finds, so I refused to feel bad for them. So, I made off with my chair-the only way it fit in my car was by folding the front passenger seat back so it was laying on the back seat.
Today at work I did some research and found out even more good news. The chair was designed by Franco Albini, an important Italian architect whose work is actually in a metalwork show that I researched for the MFAH this year. It was produced between 1949 and 1967. When I told my boss all this, she was very impressed that I scored the chair. Finally, to top it all off, a cursory Internet search has suggested that it’s worth about $1,000!