Wales Antiques

This blog will from time to time complement my Wales Antiques Web Site and its printed companion. The guide is a developing listing of general suppliers of antiques and collectables in Ceredigion, Pembrokeshire, Carmarthenshire, Powys and beyond; it now including auctions and in the future specialist heritage related attractions. Over 23 years it has become an essential resource for anyone with an interest in buying and selling antiques and collectables in West Wales and Beyond. If you would like to know more visit the site here.

Famous Welsh

Visit the fascinating world of FamousWelsh...

You Heard It Here

  • The Flying Burrito Brothers The Flying Burrito Brothers
    1 Plays

  • Vanilla Fudge Vanilla Fudge
    1 Plays

  • Steeleye Span Steeleye Span
    1 Plays

  • The Music Machine The Music Machine
    1 Plays

  • The Litter The Litter
    1 Plays

Recent Images

DSCF6519 wpid879-DSC_0373 wpid805-DSC_0328

Sponsors

Now Reading

Planned books:

Current books:

  • Turbulence

    Turbulence by Giles Foden

  • The Black Sea: The Birthplace of Civilisation and Barbarism

    The Black Sea: The Birthplace of Civilisation and Barbarism by Neal Ascherson

Recent books:

View full Library

Subscribe! Now! Juice! Fresh! Here! Free!

Fill out the form below to sign up to my newsletter and I'll drop you a line when new articles are posted.

Our strict privacy policy keeps your email address 100% safe and secure.

Disposable Sharps for Vinyl Junkies; Gramophone Needles and the Damage Done

Every day, I confess, I visit a certain charity shop. It is a rather unreconstructed affair; no pricing policies, no Fair Trade, no over-priced secondhand books and no visiting window dresser. You’ll gather that this is my kind of charity shop. It’s old school and I like it because there’s most likely something worth buying. As often as not it’s a ‘nothing’, a ‘yes-thing’ that’s cool to have around, but not a thing that will make worry about getting too rich, too quick.

Here are today’s treasures.

£1 never better spent; until tomorrow.

51TA05CE4AL. SL160  Disposable Sharps for Vinyl Junkies; Gramophone Needles and the Damage Done

Grammophon-Nadeldosen / Gramophone Needle Tins: Geschichte und Katalog mit aktuellen Bewertungen / History and Catalogue with current Valuations

  • Share/Bookmark

The Auction Surplus Shop Crosshands: John Dawson and Rosa De Bartolomeo

A reminder to any antiques, antiques related, book, or auction business in Wales COULD be listed here and at Wales Antiques; all you need to do is ask!

And here’s someone who did just that…

The Auction Surplus Shop
Crosshands (End M4)
Llanelli
Carmarthenshire
Carms SA14 6LR
tel: 01269 844505
email: auctionsurplus@gmail.com
Open: Mon-Sat 11-3; not Wed
Est: 1988; Environment Agency licensed
Owners: John Dawson, Rosa De Bartolomeo
“furniture which is pleasing, well made, functional and of good material”

  • Share/Bookmark

Junk Shop Vinyl: Nancy and Lee

Taking a cue from super-readable blog,  Diggin’ It, I thought I’d post a bit of junk shop vinyl.

nancy sinatra lee hazlewood Junk Shop Vinyl: Nancy and Lee
This is the 1968  Reprise album by  Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazelwood.

It’s a weird, though surprisingly successful,  pairing and reading the track listing you know this is going to be a patchy album; even the good is going to be over-shadowed by the spooky psyche-pop masterpiece  Some Velvet Morning.

Here is that track listing.

You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin’
Elusive Dreams
Greenwich Village Folk Song Salesman
Summer Wine
Storybook Children
Sundown, Sundown
Jackson
Some Velvet Morning
Sand
Lady Bird
I’ve Been Down So Long (It Looks Like Up to Me)

See what I mean?

Some Velvet Morning has been much covered and recently most notably by  Kate and Bobby…

All that for 49p at  Barnardo’s in Cardigan.

  • Share/Bookmark

Pair English School Watercolours: Amsterdam Canal Scene, the Munttoren.

Sometimes when collecting it isn’t neccessary, or even wise, to negotiate. You look, you establish the price, you pay, you flee. You hope you have acquired title.

These watercolours exemplify this approach. Car boot sale, loose change price, quick exit.

Examined at leisure this kind of purchase occassional disappoints; a hidden flaw the usual culprit. In this case they look better every time I look at them.

A pair of watercolours executed in a fine style, probably an English hand, of Dutch scenes; measuring 24cm x 16cm with no apparent signature.

The tower appears to be the Munttoren in Amsterdam, built in the early 17th century and the scenes look like they could be 18th or early 19th century.

Apart from that speculation I’m in the dark.

Any comments welcome.

Watercolour: Dutch Scene, Amsterdam

Watercolour: Dutch Scene

  • Share/Bookmark

H.M Stanley and the Emin Pacha Relief Expedition Commemorative Plate

If you want to test your knowledge of history to the limit, buy antiques. Which is what I did this morning.

This plate (glazed pottery, transfer printed, about 24cms across) is a fairly familar model. It was made in the later part of Queen Victoria’s reign and these commeratives most commonly depict Her Majesty at the time of her 1887 Jubilee. The better quailty versions would show scenes from her mighty Empire and were often coloured with a gilded edge.

Other figures commemorated include the Duke of Clarence, Disraeli, Gladstone and other notables of the day. The latter were typically monochrome.

What makes this unusual (for me anyway) is that I’ve never seen this subject before. Stanley I know of from broad-stroke schoolboy history and his name is usually linked with Livingstone. And of course immediately one wants to know who more about Dr Emin Bey the Emin Pacha Relief Expedition; would anyone like to tell me WITHOUT googling?

undefined

  • Share/Bookmark