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An estate seller in Portland taught me why the $6 bowl I almost skipped is worth $80
Last month I picked up a small stoneware bowl at an estate sale in Portland for $6, mostly because I liked the glaze. The woman running the sale glanced at it and asked if I had checked the bottom, and when I flipped it over she pointed out a faint impressed mark I had taken for a scratch. She told me that mark was a studio potter's stamp from the 1950s and that I should always photograph the base of every piece before I set it down, because that is where the value hides. I started doing that with everything now, flipping bowls, vases, and even old lamps, and last weekend the same habit helped me spot a signed piece at a flea market in Beaverton that I would have walked right past. I used to buy only what looked pretty from the front, which cost me who knows how many good finds over the years. Does anyone else have a rule they follow the second they pick something up, or a tip a seller gave you that changed your whole routine?
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jason25010d ago
Learned the hard way that flipping everything over is not always the move, at least not at the sales I hit. Half the estate sellers around here price stuff by the mark once they see you checking, and I have watched a $10 vase turn into a $60 vase just because I was dumb enough to flip it in front of them. Now I snap a photo of the base while it is still on the table and walk away before I make a face. The signature and stamp matter, sure, but reading the room matters just as much.
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