Snake Auction Observer: good furniture, undervalued, or eternal, all selected off LiveAuctioneers.com, with an emphasis this week on seating, lights. Immediate auctions first… but first, housekeeping:
Picked/designed some home gyms for GQ at various price points ($100, $250, $1,000, $5,000) with the idea of them being built differently/supplemental to commercial gyms, which, at best, you can squat in. My idea here was trinkets like manual treadmills, fan bikes, landmines are best: they offer dynamic workouts that help posture, and the like… even getting a kB and some bands is the path. Only thing that’s missing is a cable column; better than squatting heavy, which should only be done if you’re strong and coordinated.
Auctions:
Pesce Feltri lounge chair, Glen Cove NY: Saturday auction from Long Island featuring many odds and ends (Pearsall, frosted glass eagle, lots of porcelain, some Kaws (I love art), these decent mirror columns), one that sticks out is this Gaetano Pesce’s Feltri lounge chair, from the ‘80s, a rare item fully within the Venn overlap between this newsletter and the popular zeitgeist/discussion. Pesce is an interesting guy, he was working in design semi-obscurity (paid, but known only in Euro mags, and to old fans) until Jim Walrod put him on a decade ago; eventually people caught up. There’s a nice story about him by the g Sam Hine in GQ, about his Bottega chairs at Basel last year… he had open studios on the UES as recently as a couple years ago. (I went, he hadn’t arrived yet.) What’s great about this resurgence is even his new work remains super abstract, alive and advanced… all the pomp and circumstance hasn’t seeped into his skin. I mean, he’s 80. The Feltri a few different shapes—some are splayed out like mushrooms; vertical ones like these are better—and run around $4,000 stateside and way less in Europe. Less a steal than an investment, but a deal at $1,900
Ross Littell thatched PLR 1 Barcelona-type chair, Glen Cove NY: Another from this house—have not seen this chair before, a kind of Brazilian take on Mies van der Rohe (talented) ‘29 Barcelona chair, the one Tom Wolfe takes a shit on in the Bauhaus book… Barcelonas (you’ve seen them) sit somewhere between legal graffiti and neon signs with inspiring slogans: impossible… Though, to be frank, mostly it’s retros we’re seeing. I bet a pre-war looks nice. This Littell looks Brazilian because of its thatches—not exactly what Percival Lafer would use, but not far off. Littell worked in the ‘50s, made another like this but a bench; this nice set of loungers he designed for Padova is a favorite. These, from the ‘60s don’t show up often and mostly sell in Europe. $1,500
Smith & Watson Library stairs, LI: There’s something design-forward about step ladders. Because they’re so utilitarian, and are pretty much only sold in hardware stores—the Home Depot in Red Hook is right next to a restaurant supply store, on the way in I caught four guys loading up their van with a dozen drums of soybean oil and nearly threw up—the “look at me” part of the design sits behind its practicality… but, of course, since they’re purely functional, the design serves a higher purpose and the best ones look like something. What does it mean that only construction sites and libraries use step ladders? Something. This one’s built with stout Makita dimensions but is British and gilded. Smith & Watson, who makes it, is UK style, based in Queens longtime. Not super into their stuff but this Bagatelle’s not bad. Fair at $350—one in worse condition sold for 3 a bit ago—really just one of those things you get when your place is pretty much done.
Pierre Cardin lighter, LA: The deeper the furniture hole opens, the more and more we should all realize Cardin isn’t a fashion designer but an industrial designer. What, are you going to wear a coral color jacket outside? Come on. This, on the other hand… well, what can be said? Looks like a sarcophagus, or a Braun. $150—price history is one of these being sold once for exactly that dollar amount.
No-name modern blue chair, LA: Sort of a no-name square Artifort-era Paulin-looking chair—same colors, same light angle gradation—being auctioned in LA. House has some more cheap no-names from the era, also the Cardin above, this Ponte table, a bunch of the quick hits; deal at $150
Waterfall coffee table, no name, LA: Harsh plastic flat furniture is too Miami/Dubai for me, but done well—like anything else—it hits. This one’s a companion to Cini Boeri’s Ghost chair: neither have lines, both are imposing and quiet. One of my theories about people’s conservativism about furniture—only sticking to one style, or not buying anything wild, or thinking very long and very hard about every purchase—is that they haven’t actually cycled through much furniture themselves over the course of their lives. Not at the same rate they might have clothing. But after enough reps everything becomes easy. It’s not hard to buy a table. You just call a few people. With couches as with jeans, at a certain point, if you’ve done it all, whatever’s good that’s next is worth doing. So you roll the dice. Why not do Miami Vice (2006)? Decent at $600
Mangiarotti Lesbo lamp, Florida, IHS: Angelo Mangiarotti as an architect is a giant, he designed a number of railway stations (Repubblica in Milan, Certosa there, more) and buildings—casa a tre cilindri… look at this thing:
and in his free time made furniture. Those designs seem to all have a bit of the sloughed-off casual heavy genius to them in the way that ones by architects do. He probably banged this one out in an hour. Close to the mushroom lamp people dug a couple years back; pics don’t do it justice—super bad lighting here, nasty. Price history for these things is spotty: almost all in Europe, usually around $1,000 flat—this one’s a bit more, but hard to get stateside. $1,200
Mangiarotti Loico bookshelf, Florida: These AM bookshelves sit somewhere between harsh deco, ancient Greece and the minor tributaries of Italian design; seems like the missing link between, I don’t know, Colombo and Kagan. Loico’s the storage system here, it comprises a console as well—house has a marble one, too. No real price history: one sold for $20,000 in 2007—Bruce Willis bought it?—everything else was in Europe, or passed. Not cheap, $2,200, but not bad.
van der Rohe MR20 chair, Fl: Wicker furniture is another low buy scenario, like Deco, that I like: you get a lot of design and quality for your money… since the best designed wicker pieces (this one) are nails, but the bad ones are so obviously bad that they cast their shadow over the entire medium and thus depress all prices. I’m also a fan of buying a minor design from an epochal designer (scroll up for a one-word parenthetical MvdR bio). This one’s staid, then the arms jump out on second viewing; after a while the arms become so loud and grotesque you wonder how it got produced. Transgressive, nasty… price history is ~$300 per chair; Snake’s Lock of the Week at $200
Quick Hits:
Knoll Swivel chairs, $50, LI (super steal if you’re local)
Pfister Knoll chair, $375, LI (shiny as shit, near-perfect office chair)
Cain modern lucite bench, $450, LA (harsh and plain, half dumb)
Izzy modern sofa, $750, LA (decent Eames Compact ripoff; could be cheaper)
Custom metal credenza, $450, LA (Harsh, budget Haller/Knoll office look)
Sirkin Lewis coffee table, $750, LA (sleeper slick, imposing, Miami Vice ‘06)
Gold bust of a child, $500, Florida (has curly hair, just like me)
Fish serving tray, $150, LA (speaks for itself)
Thanks for reading.
Snake