Author: Michael Chappell

Some blurb or other on the morning TV news about a decline in consumer confidence for the month of October. For those of us in the art and antiques trade, this comes as no surprise. Although we have billed out what Keith terms ‘little money’ over the course of the last few weeks, no big invoices, but we remain hopeful. We have had discussions with some of our better colleagues about why they are doing fairs just now, mindful of poor performance of the same shows this time last year and considering the present state of the economy. One colleague wondered aloud thereupon why then he is subjecting himself to additional financial exposure by doing the same show this year. Well, that is a question.

While promotion is key to a show’s success, one must still be mindful of what Keynes considered a central component of any economic cycle, ‘animal instincts’, which, frankly, is a grittier synonym for ‘consumer confidence’. No one can really point to anything that affects it, but, ultimately, it is this that will make conditions change- one way or the other. Apparently one can apply statistical measures to animal instincts, but this doesn’t make them any more predictable.

However, fairs do go on, and sort of paraphrasing Knute Rockne, in a poor season, one always says one was at least building character. While of course those remaining few of us in the English antiques trade are mostly trying to figure out how to cover the overhead, Keith and I yet make a point in engaging in some strategic thinking- changes in market conditions, appropriate pricing, and changes in fashion and aesthetics, all of which we need to factor into our business to make it always appear fresh and viable. We are, of course, still a going concern. Nothing spells disaster for a business than that its appearance starts to match the (dismal) outlook of the owner.

And this is what is always necessary for an antiques and art fair, even in tough times. Constant reinvention is called for, to give the fair a fresh look. Mind you, not an entirely new look. A couple of years ago, one prominent fair rather abandoned its focus on antiques, and, since it had dropped its dateline to allow midcentury modern furniture in, went overboard in redesigning the show in using 20th century design as its theme. An aesthetic disaster which resulted in the show wisely returning to something more traditional the following year.

No strong intelligence yet on the success of the International Fine Art & Antique Dealers Fair, concluded Thursday of last week. Those intrepid dealers who participated, those we spoke to anyway whose focus is English antiques, seemed to subscribe to the same credo as whoever wrote The New York Times headline, something along the lines of ‘Fair forges ahead despite hard times.’ Well, absent forging ahead, what does a body do?

Time will, as it always does, tell, but news that may at least take the fair’s temperature should be quickly forthcoming, as some material does tend to sell at shows. Jewelry for one, and some smaller items. Copper and brass, prints, and, I hate to use the word, collectibles, certainly pieces at impulse buy level, or, in the case of prints, where an interior designer may seek to create a series of something. Art work and larger pieces of furniture, even irresistible English antiques pieces, are, I admit, a bit tougher, as the purchaser needs just the right space, or with art work, it has to speak to the buyer. In our experience, art work in particular, if it sells at a show, is something that is already in play with the buyer, oftentimes for many months previously. With all that, a fair number of smaller at show sales portends some fairly good aftershow activity for dealers of other types of material that is less of the impulse buy variety.

And, of course, it is getting interested buyers to turn out that is the name of the game, and ultimately, yields a successful show. We haven’t always done well at fairs with a big gate, but our overwhelming experience has shown us, no question, it is a numbers game, and by sheer weight of numbers, the larger the attendance, the better the chance of sales, either at show or following. Keith and I have often laughingly repeated what a show promoter told us during the run of a poorly attended show- ‘Not many visitors, but those who are here are very qualified.’ Hardly good enough- we require lots and lots of qualified buyers attending.

While the organizer/promoters’ promotion is imperative, it is not solely the show promoters’ responsibility to perform this essential task. No argument, those who participate need to have a firm understanding with the promoter what it is that’s planned- and how much the promoter plans to spend to promote the show. Any fuzziness- well, that may not be the show a dealer wishes to do. Still, asking the tough questions is only part of it. Any dealer who doesn’t spend a significant amount of time performing his own promotional tasks gets what he deserves. A dealer who does not mine his existing sales contacts to inform them of his show participation is either lazy or foolish or both. Why on earth would one not just out of sheer politeness inform past customers that they will be in the customers’ neighborhood? Further, all of us anymore sell to interior designers- let them know and search for other local designers who might use your material, and inform them, too, of your impending presence. Likewise institutional collectors. Museums do make the more than occasional antiques fair purchase.

A goodly number of fairs still retain a charity component to them, either a preview gala or part of the gate benefits some worthy cause. That is fine, but, times being the way they are, the participating dealers need to benefit now more than ever from the charity’s efforts. It has been lost sight of, unfortunately, that the charity show has always been considered a symbiosis- the dealers provide an attractive venue that the charity then utilizes as a space for an expensive gala- with the great and the good attending free to make purchases from the dealers. If the charity is not doing their utmost to generate attendance at at least the gala, perhaps a new charity needs to take over, or a dealer might rethink their involvement with that charity’s fair. Moreover, it has always seemed to me that an underutilized strategy is to have multiple fair beneficiaries- with multiple charity evenings for multiple charities. The fair itself is all set up for days and doesn’t cease to be a wonderful venue for events. With all that, if one benefit charity believes that other charity events will create an overlap and compete for possible attendees, charities should think then about making more of an effort to offer sponsorship events to private enterprise. So often, charities will ask for sponsorship, put the donors name in the show catalog, and, upon giving gala preview tickets to the great and the good, decide to call it a day. Why shouldn’t the perk for the great and the good be a private preview for themselves and their own good clients?

Finally, in these days of celebrity interior designers, any good fair that does not have an evening designer only event is not a good fair. Designers need to feel catered to and that their business is worthwhile, and it is. Moreover, designers unless they are shopping for or with a client oftentimes do not always make it a point to attend fairs. We have heard from charities that designer only events in particular are felt to run competition with benefit preview parties. I have never, ever found this to be true. In fact, just the opposite has been my experience. A number of fairs for a number of years have held designer only ‘hard hat’ previews, run in advance of the gala preview, at which designers could attend on their own, have something to eat and drink, and scout out the show. With a typical prohibition against actually selling anything at a hard hat preview, the designer then is obliged to bring his client back at the earliest opportunity. That earliest opportunity is almost always the charity gala. The moral of the story, for those of you who have not already figured it out, the designer and their client(s) would not have attended the gala preview had the designer not had the opportunity to shop the show beforehand.

With the demise of the Grosvenor House fair and the summer Olympia sufficiently moribund that its promotion and management has recently changed hands, one wonders why, with the trade, shall we say, less than robust, we now have at least two additional fairs taking advantage of the London season. Any void there was sans Grosvenor House was at best only perceived, surely.

As an inveterate fair participant, and formerly an inveterate fair goer, that fairs are on hard times I find distressing. As my loyal cadre of readers will gather, we always enjoy our fairs participation, as it allows us to see clients with whom we may only have contact at a fair, and colleagues, likewise. We have always told ourselves, in locations where our business is strong, if we didn’t participate in a local fair, we would then in the alternative have a trunk show. Moreover, even when we do not sell well at a show, we considered it at least good promotion, allowing us to stay in front of good clients and, given that not all clients buy all the time, acquire a few collector and design contacts that, in the fullness of time, may make a purchase.

With all that, our best promotional tool remains our own gallery, with perforce the largest selection of our stock of English antiques and artwork, but nothing can substitute for the fairs as a gallery adjunct.

Or can it? One immediately assumes that antiques and art fairs have profoundly hit the skids just at this time, another casualty of the global economic meltdown. I would frankly argue that fairs generally were struggling well before the excreta hit the economic fan last year, with our own show experience other the course of the last five years very spotty. As I mentioned, we had always solaced ourselves that poor at-show performance would always pay off as good promotion, and, given our short tenure in the antiques trade, we had nothing to compare to.

What was short is now, some would say, venerable, as is the thing that I believe has probably had as great an impact on antiques fairs as anything- the internet. While we have assumed that shopping a fair provides a great one stop experience for collectors and designers who are seeking a disparate, albeit of a similar high quality, class of goods- paintings and furniture and bibelots- browsing the internet provides the same opportunity, and one doesn’t have to shave, or put clothes on, for that matter. Of course, our material is essentially tactile so those that browse our website will always come in for a look before they buy. The linkage between our gallery and the internet is strong, with actual and virtual galleries easily accessible. While we are open literally all the time, a fair is only an annual event.

Are the fairs, then, going the way of the three-cornered hat? Not if Chappell & McCullar can help it. Before we begin to hear ‘Messiah complex’, my modest suggestions tomorrow…

We’ve been pleased to have the opportunity to assist one of our better clients in putting together a collection of Georgian seating furniture. An avid collector of English antiques and nearing the end of his business career, he has sought to replace reproduction pieces with the same models, but 18th century.

Amongst some collectors, the received wisdom is that period seating furniture is one or both of the following- fragile, and uncomfortable. I must say that we subscribed to these fallacies ourselves until we determined, and handling many score pieces over the years might teach one a thing or two, seating furniture is like any other class of goods- some survive in good condition, and some do not. Moreover, what makes for something particularly worthwhile is not just the ‘show’ frame, but the underframe, typically of softer wood, that can, with generations of upholstery tacks, be in deplorable condition. For any collector, and this is important, it is not what you see but the underframe that you don’t see that makes for comfortable and serviceable period seating furniture.

When discussing the facets of collecting this manner of goods with our seating collector client, we used for our exemplar a wonderful large mid 18th century sofa we had sold a couple of years ago.  Retentive as we are, we had photographed the piece extensively with the cover stripped off, to make manifest to any prospective purchaser, or an antiques show vetting committee, the original condition of the frame. Interestingly, we were so pleased with the condition of the piece with the cover taken off, we consequently had the sofa displayed in our galleries in this shape for a number of weeks. Keith and I would blithely describe the virtues of the piece and couldn’t understand that, far from sharing our enthusiasm, a fair number of visitors actually averted their gaze. What became clear to us is that seeing the naked frame for most people is the equivalent of interrupting the embalmer at work- one would rather not be too aware of the process, preferring to see, as it were, the finished product once it emerges from the back room.

We were pleased to see Howard Walwyn and Nigel Raffety, arguably the world’s best dealers in period clocks, and our near neighbors along London’s Kensington Church Street. They are in New York, with a stand at the International Fine Art and Antique Dealers Show, running through October 22 at the Park Avenue Armory.

As well as supreme horologists, Howard and Nigel are about as sunny in disposition as any dealers I know, a crowd given to, shall we say, complaining (actually, the term I was going to use starts with a ‘B’, but I have no wish to offend any of my gentler readers). Still, their assessment of the show was on a par with the sentiments expressed late last week in the New York Times, to the extent that hard times in the antiques trade are what some must just live through. Moreover, the important thing to remember is there will be a show and it will doubtless have some very good things in it. Raffety and Walwyn will not be the only dealer transiting the Atlantic, with redoubtable English antiques dealer Simon Phillips also making the trip from London.

Shopping the show is always a feast for the eyes, with collectors and designers from all over the country there to shop. Despite the year, plenty of people are nosing around, including one of the powerhouses of design, Michael Smith.

What will the show bring that might reflect green shoots for all the rest of us? We will know in the fullness of time. Will there be any bargains at the show? Well, frankly, yes- any time someone can get full value for one’s money, I count that as a good bargain. And the International Show is a venue offering absolutely the finest quality. Moreover, based on the sales of English furniture at auction in New York last week, with rampant auction fever resulting in a number of lots selling hugely over their high auction estimate, it appears more and more that an art and antiques dealer is absolutely the best place to make a good-value purchase.