Learning the biz

I sometimes get asked how I know about all this stuff about antiques, as if one either knows it all, or is totally ignorant on this front. But that "all this stuff about antiques" question starts things on the wrong foot. Some know more than others, but no one knows about everything under that big umbrella called antiques, which in its broadest sense is the material summation of human kind since its dawn.

So, I don't know about antiques per se. I know about certain segments of the marketplace. Early photos, folk art and military are some of my favorites. But I also do early silver, jewelry, timepieces and guns. Furniture, too. It's a hierarchy. There are categories that are at the very apex of my pyramid-shaped knowledge base. This is true for most general dealers and auctioneers that deal in antiques. At that top of the pyramid is a focused area about which they know the most. As you expand outward the depth of knowledge decrease, but the breadth of subjects increases. Most of us in the antiques business knew, early on, a mentor who was one of those folks with a gigantic pyramid. That pyramid didn't see its layers get bigger, but instead grew in its entirety, gobbling up everything it could about a stunning array of fields in antiques. Sure, they had their apex, and what a big apex it was, they truly knew a very lot about quite a few things, and knew enough about an even bigger group of objects.

Rarer is the true expert, the person who has only the top of the pyramid, and who has chosen to abandon the other layers to make that peak enormous. These are the gurus in their fields. They devote a lifetime to one subsection, and they rule that area along with a few peers. They trade on their depth of knowledge, and the reputation that comes with it. They run specialized shops, or trade in just one type of object, and because they become known as the cream of the crop in one area, they often command many of the very best objects in their fields.

The jack of all trades go to these most devoted dealers when they get stuck or research, or have a particularly choice piece to sell.

Perhaps the pyramids of each of the best of both groups wind up as roughly the same size. While one is all encompassing, the other is a focused slice that has been cut off and grown for decades. There are categorical specialists that are very happy in their nook of the antiques business.

But there is only so much room in a brain, and that pyramid can only get so big. There are only so many hours in the day. One eventually chooses to become one type or the other.

At 30, I'm interested in a host of subjects, and continue to grow my knowledge in those areas. But I can't resist continuing to explore the world of antiques at large, and the many areas of material it offers. In a fast-paced world, this may creep up as the way to go for someone who makes a career in this business. The more focused, academic track can be a fulfilling, enriching path on which much is learned about a specific subject. But if one hopes to feed his family in this business, the broader road is looking more like the way to go.

For one thing, business is about seizing opportunities. The more general knowledge one has, the more opportunities there are to seize. And with every opportunity is the chance to grow a business.

Tastes are also changing all the time. Plenty of antique dealers remember when Victorian furniture was in demand and pricey. I can't imagine what the uber Victorian specialists/dealers are doing today. Making it, but not in the world they once enjoyed. Perhaps they don't care, maybe the learning is enough.

But again, when it's a business, antiques can not only be about that. So the broad path is also a good hedge against changing buying habits. Today's mid-century modern will eventually become yesterday's Victorian hall tree. I want to be there, and in the running, when that next hot thing comes along.