Date: Fri 25-Sep-1998
Date: Fri 25-Sep-1998
Publication: Ant
Author: JUDYC
Quick Words:
Vanity
Full Text:
What Price Vanity?
w/1 cut
By Rita Easton
PORT EWEN, N.Y. -- On August 5, Auctions Unlimited, Inc, distributed
catalogues to its mailing list for examinations preceding an August 26 closing
on its third mail/phone/fax/internet auction of 72 lots of ladies' vanity
items, including compacts, beaded bags, and mesh purses. Forty bidders
resulted, to compete for items ranging from a $700 bag to $10 for a lot of
five 1950s used lipsticks.
The top price of $700 went to a brown velvet 1920s purse in a multi-colored
celluloid frame, the lot measuring approximately 7« inches wide. From the
frame closing of the bag hung a celluloid bird on a chain, which dangled a
third the length of the bag.
A multi-colored 1920s beaded purse with predominant shades of red, blue and
brown, having a sunburst center motif and bead fringe along the bottom, sold
at $160, and powder boxes made for retail compacts averaged approximately $50.
An unusual powder puff in its original box, accompanied by a card on which
there was a poem and an image of a flapper, was double sided, with one side
for powder and the other for rouge. Called a "Peggy Powrou Puff," it realized
$80.
A porcelain powder box with a colonial lady forming the handle sold at $160;
two Schuco Company perfumes reached $200 each, one container a dressed monkey,
the other in mohair "au naturel"; and a bisque black bathing beauty wearing an
original Hawaiian hula skirt, 4Â inches high, realized $100.
Compacts were headlined by an example used as an advertising piece, having an
enamelled reproduction of a Pepsi-Cola bottle cap embedded in its center. It
achieved $170.
A porcelain Goebel half doll, nude, with three feathers in her hair, 5â¹ inches
high, made $130; and three powder-patters, which are powder puffs each mounted
on a stick, ranged from $30 to $60.
Unlikely as it seems, buyers came out for 1940s and 50s used and unused tubes
of lipstick. A lot of five tubes, two French and three American examples, some
used and some intact, drew $10 for the group.
A sterling silver card case or change purse, deeply engraved, with a London
hallmark and blue satin lining, garnered $40, which was the bargain of the
day, and a glass paperweight advertising "Little Nemo," a jewelry
manufacturing company, went for $30.
"There is a whole group of people who look forward to these sales," remarked a
spokeswoman for the gallery. "We advertise on the Internet and people who live
in remote places who can't get out to antiques shows appreciate the
convenience."
Prices quoted do not reflect a required ten percent premium.