Antique Resources in Chicago
The store specializes in fine European antiques, with focus on antique lighting fixtures.
You can't walk in off the street, but must ring the bell and wait for the door to be opened for you.
Although I find the items are expensive and don't buy from shops, I do enjoy seeing what they have available.
The prices for these dolls were each near $300.
The tag says Late 19th Century Louis XVI end table with marble top and bronze mounts.
$1500. Unlike new furniture, antiques often appreciate in value.
This Victorian era cut glass lamp has been electrified but was originally an oil lamp. The long dangling pointed crystal prisms helped to refract light.
Antique inkwell desk set
The tag says
circa 1880 Italian Napoleon III Inlaid Brass and Lacquered Mahogany Inkwell
$1,033.00
One compartment holds a small, glass ink bottle and another holds a pounce pot. A pounce pot was used to sprinkle fine powder (like sand or chalk) over ink to speed up drying.
A carved wooden figure, the Blackamoor motif has been used in furniture and decorative arts for centuries, particularly from the 17th through the 19th centuries.
In contemporary times, the Blackamoor is highly controversial. It's widely seen as a problematic symbol due to its origins in colonialism, slavery, and iracial stereotypes.
The Sphinx was revived as an element of Egyptomania following Napoleon's Egyptian campaigns. In the late 18th to early 19th centuries a carved wooden piece like this may have been central on a fireplace mantle with candlesticks on each side. The tag indicates the price is $2900.
These carved stone animals, roaring tiger and drinking elephant, probably flanked a doorway or gate.
Wandering through antique shops give a look back to a different era, culture, and the lives of those who made and used the object before. Each piece has a story to tell.
The prices in a shop like this are outside of my budget, but learning the value gives a good idea of an objects worth if you come across something similar at a garage sale!
