The specialist guide to Asian antiques and exotic home decor from the far east.

March 16, 2009 8:09 am

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Working with a freight forwarder specializing in furniture packing and shipping

If you are in an antiques, furniture, or any other import related business, then the packing and shipping of your goods will be a crucial logistical detail which should not easily be overlooked. Since many buyers are unable to maintain a permanent office in China, and surely not individual buyers purchasing for their homes, they logically often turn to third-party packing agents to fill this void. Yet, packing and crating can determine if your item arrives without a scratch or rather in several pieces. Ocean Shipping might be a short direct hop across seas or turn out to be a  long delayed drawn out journey through canals and via detours. And even short term warehousing might mean either brief storage or long term loss of your product in someone else’s warehouse.

"A main issue, is with customers understanding of these providers scope of business (and their capabilities) - with the most common misconception being that these companies will take responsibility for getting your products picked up, packed and shipped out in good condition"

A read on ACF’s China’s furniture industry blog of the post entitled, “Using a consolidator for international shipping, freight, packing and inspection of antique furniture” talks at length about what to expect, what to look out for.

Read More….

The specialist guide to Asian antiques and exotic home decor from the far east.

February 5, 2009 9:29 am

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Shanghai Trade Show: Antique Furniture China 2009

http://www.antiquefurniturefair.com/

 

	Showdates：	May 15-18,2009
	Venue：	Shanghai Exhibition Center （No.1000 Yan`an Road (Middle)Shanghai P.R.China
	Approved by : Shanghai Foreign Economic Relation & Trade Commission Shanghai Cultural Administration Committee
	Organizer：	Shanghai Antique Dealers Association Shanghai Real Exhibition Service Co., Ltd.
	Sponsors:	Shanghai Collection Association Zhejiang Collection Association Shanghai Zhongfu Curio Center Shanghai Yunzhou Curio Center Shanghai Friendship Department Store ShenZhen Curio Center Shanghai Curio & Artworks Almanac Edition Commission “Art & Collection “(Magazine) www.online.sh.cn
	Exhibits Range:	All kinds of Asia antiques & fine Arts,, Western antiques & fine Arts, lacquers, jade, porcelain, silverware, jewelry, clocks, oil-painting, carpets, stone carvings, western furniture, traditional tea & tea culture wares, snuff pots, copper carvings, Tanka, figure of Buddha, embroidery，ename

The specialist guide to Asian antiques and exotic home decor from the far east.

January 20, 2009 4:57 am

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With this Chinese noodle cabinet-scholar cabinet, appearances can be deceiving!

A customer recently sent me these photos of a Chinese Noodle cabinet which they purchased from an estate auction. Their inquiry was pertaining to its age, value and authenticity. In other words, a quick antique appraisal. The question of course was the one I am asked most frequently which was “Is it old and is it valuable”

Is it really old?

If you read "Blurring the line" you know answering this question becomes even more difficult when you consider the awkward journey a piece my take as it travels through the "antique-reproduction" supply chain.

The first question of “is it old” is quite easy to answer: Yes and No. Before going any further, take a moment to read a post from a while back entitled “Blurring the line further… How to tell if its a genuine antique?” which will explain just nicely the points to consider here. Finished yet? Ok, great - back to this item.

In this particular case, the actual cabinet itself is a very common tapered edge Chinese Noodle cabinet or “Mian tiao gui” since the shape of the cabinet itself or the hardware (depending on who you talk to) slightly resembles the shape of a noodle. With carved doors like this, it may be mistaken for a scholar cabinet. In un-restored form, a cabinet like this may be referred to by the workers as as a “la ji gui” which literally means “trash cabinet.”A Chinese country antique cabinet such as the one above, in un-restored form, built from common woods (value is often placed on exotic hardwoods), of a non-descript style and in poor condition will often hold minimal value on its own, with its true worth being essentially as parts and raw materials. From a materials cost perspective, a badly damaged cabinet will be cheaper to restore then to build new from scratch.

A quick look at the overall process…

Here is a quick overview of what typically occurs:

1. Take a fairly standard poor condition country antique cabinet ranging in age from 30 to 80 years old, which can be used for parts & materials
2. Restore main structure, replacing damaged panels and other sections with replacement wood.
3. Add in additional details to spice it up like carved panels.
4. Add shelves and drawers for additional functionality (easier to sell)
5. Add a new lacquered finish to cover inexpensive woods, repairs, etc.
6. Use aging technique so item does not look “too new.”
7. Add detailed gold “miao jin” painting for an additional touch.
8. Install new hardware.
9. Claim to customer it is Qing dynasty scholar cabinet, at least 150 years old and sell at a premium price.
   
10. Finished!

A “trash cabinet,” like the one pictured above,may often be worth more for its parts then the sum.

Is it worth anything?

The answer is yes! However, maybe not for the reasons you might expect. Its worth something, because of the time and effort that an artisan put in hand-painting the gold trim and other details. Its worth something, every time someone visits your home and remarks what a beautiful cabinet it is. And its worth something, because you probably have a story about where and how you purchased it. So while it may not be worth an extreme amount in dollars, money is not the only value of worth. Its a beautiful piece and would look great in any home, and you never know - in 100 years down the road it just might be someone else’s genuine antique!

Some pretty standard inexpensive Chinese noodle cabinets up for sale on the internet

The specialist guide to Asian antiques and exotic home decor from the far east.

January 7, 2009 8:43 am

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Furniture Repairs: Improper restoration causes this "Old Shanghai" table-top to buckle and split

(Click images to enlarge)

 Question:

A reputable local antique Chinese furniture dealer sold us this nice Chinese table. It cracked a few months after getting it.  He has his own shop to produce furniture as well as sell antiques. I am sending you 3 photos, 1 of each side of the table, and 1 of the whole thing.  So there are really 2 large cracks in this poor beautiful old table. Can it be repaired rather than replace the top?

Answer:

Its hard to tell exactly from the photos (which are not so clear) but from what I can see, it looks like this is a colonial old Shanghai (also known as Lao Shanghai) art deco style table. The sides seem missing as normally this style of table has four “pointed” corner plates on the sides which when pulled up/opened (kind of like a drop leaf table) make the table square instead of hexagonal. Maybe they were missing when the item was collected in un-restored form, or maybe it was just too much trouble to replace/repair them. Who knows…

Also, again, its hard to tell from the photos but I think there are probably a number of portions of this piece which are completely new, though I cannot say at what percent without clearer photos. One of the legs “feels” new. I have seen the delicate tops buckle sometimes on un-restored colonial style tables over time, so it would not be surprising if it needed to be repaired during restoration and this is where the problem seems to have occurred. Repairs are normal for this sort of furniture and whats important is not the repair but rather how it was repaired.

Seems the issue with the cracked and split top, is that when the top was repaired, in a few places it seems that new wood replacement boards (glued together) were used, instead of using properly dried wood, old aged wood or reclaimed wood. In door environments, in particular where dry electric heat is used can accelerate this sort of cracking.

That’s probably why the cracking occurred as the wood was still moist and not fully dried. With old and/or reclaimed wood where the wood has had plenty of time to dry this is much less of a problem. The choice of wood used for this section can also have an effect as some woods are more prone to cracking (like pine) then others.

Another give away here is the actual edges on the new boards, as well as the patina itself, don’t match the rest of the delicate nature of the piece. Notice the thickness? There is also visible saw marks in the new boards. In fact, it might not even be the same species of wood. The grain seems much courser on the new boards.

It can be repaired, though the damaged board most likely should be replaced with something a bit more appropriate to the piece and following the recommendations above.

The specialist guide to Asian antiques and exotic home decor from the far east.

September 18, 2007 5:17 pm

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Blurring the line further… How to tell if its a genuine antique?

If you read my previous post “blurring the line” you know how difficult it is to honestly decide whether or not an item should be considered an “genuine Chinese antique.” Answering this question becomes even more difficult when you consider the awkward journey a piece my take as it travels through the “antique-reproduction” supply chain. Consider this attractive low table, we purchase and restored for a customer in Italy. The first picture (upper left) is what it looked like when we purchased it BEFORE restoration. The last two on the bottom are the final result AFTER restoration.

The cabinet itself is a antique. It was collected from a peasant on a farm by a “materials collector” who then sold it to what we would consider to be a wholesale antiques flea market far off in Shanxi province, to the west of Beijing. From there is was bought (in bulk along with many, many other pieces) by a local furniture factory who re-laquered the front and completely retouched (actually repainted) the beautiful gold painting you see on the front of the piece. Or what DID the front look like in the first place? Maybe there never was any red lacquer and the peice was just a common wood color. So while the delicate gold “miao jin” paintings and trim look old, they are in fact completely new. Why is this?

Click here to continue on to our site and read the rest of this article…

The specialist guide to Asian antiques and exotic home decor from the far east.

February 15, 2008 1:27 am

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Do you know what you are selling? Because your customer might not.

I am noticing a trend where just about “everyone and anyone” is now selling so called “Chinese antique furniture” (or some variation of this) and misrepresenting it as any number of different things. Items made just yesterday (antique reproductions) are falsely labeled as genuine antiques and the real antiques are often completely misclassified. I recently saw an antique Tibetan sideboard cabinet labeled as coming from Mongolia. Sometimes, this is just the result of the importer not having access to good product history and background information (and thus the purpose of this specialists blog). But in other instances its pure marketing and the low-end/mass-produced is being promoted as high end/hand-made. There is an interesting article in the New York Times about this entitled “Look-Alikes Draw Lawyers’ Stares” and one quote from this article seems to really sum it up in a nutshell:

Click here to continue on to our site and read the rest of this article…

The specialist guide to Asian antiques and exotic home decor from the far east.

August 22, 2008 10:11 am

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ACF China appears on China Central Television's "Culture Express" program

A while back, ACF’s Roger Schwendeman was featured on CCTV (China Central Television) Channel 4’s program Culture Express. CCTV 4 is broadcast throughout China, Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan and worldwide via satellite.

CCTV’s team accompanied Roger for several days during buying trips of un-restored Chinese antiques, and then onward to oversee the next steps of restorations and repairs. They also accompanied him to the Panjiayuan weekend market. We have not yet uploaded the video but plan to do so to soon.

Click here to continue on to our site and read the rest of this article…