Well, yes in some ways. Perhaps not as strongly as some of your language suggests, and not because I must have lived in a past life or different era. I do seem to love and try as much to collect 18th and 19th century English pieces. Fortunately, I live in a very large metropolitan area with an unending supply of antique malls, stores, estate sales, garage sales, etc., at which I can usually fulfill my latest desire. Recently I bought a piece I've been wanting for at least 15 years; an English c. 1885 secretary on which I am using to post this follow up! I do love antiques and probably acquired that love from a wonderful lady who lived next door to our family while I was growing up. She started an antique business in her home and I was amongst these exquisite English antiques every single day. I played with the beautiful sterling collections, explored all the intricacies of the case goods, and couldn't wait for the next shipment....all while babysitting her children so the ladies who could afford her pieces, shopped in her home. Later she moved it to a commercial building and later sold it. Now it is a well-established antique business in Miss. and I still go there anytime I'm home to drown myself in the surroundings! I also have a favorite antique dealer in my current location, who seems to have the perfect eye for pieces when she goes to market in England. I guess it's in my blood and will never go out! Thanks for starting another interesting thread.

Oh what a great story angeldog, you were marked at an early age and there is nothing you can do about it. It's in the blood like a race horse. (lol)

I love antiques too but my taste has changed over the years. I love 18th and 19 century pieces as well. But I also like shabby chic things and very french pieces and even a little country thrown in. I am beginning to love guandy pieces, formal dressy things.

When I see these things I feel a little high, just a tad, and my creative juices start flowing.

I am drawn to antiques, and like to imagine who might have owned them before me, although I don't feel like my fondness for them is based on childhood memories or anything like that. Mostly, I like the look and quality (no pressboard or staples, etc.) and, like newdawn, enjoy shabby chic, french country, country, and more formal pieces (which is why my house may look like a schizophrenic was let loose with a credit card!).

I will have to think about this!

I remember when I was about 9 or 10 I got to choose my decor for the 1st time. I REALLY wanted a white iron bed and periwinkle paint from an antique store (we didn't have a house of antiques or anything, so I don't even know why I wanted this) but my mom (born in '32) said it reminded her of an old hospital bed, so she talked me out of it. Somehow I ended up instead with white laminate "Scandinavian" furniture and a deep raspberry on the walls. I HATED it, but of course, did not complain to my parents since I at least finally had my own room!

We moved when I was 14, and I got the smallest room. As a consolation, my mom let me pick my furniture and my sister got my old set (she didn't care, oddly). This time, I DID get an antique set (mahogany bed and dresser) and and old, old quilt. That felt right to me . . .

I don't think I can relate this to a past-life, as I don't think there is any one period that pulls me (though if I had to say, I would guess I am drawn mostly to the early 1900s). I just think that older furniture has more warmth, more of a human feeling than so much of more contemporary furniture.

Interesting topic!

I love a mix of old and newer things - I don't crave antiques but I do love antique furniture. I don't want my house to look like a museum or to be too cluttered, but a few well placed pieces of antique furniture that isn't too fussy in design is my idea of a rich decor. I feel the same about accessories - a mix of newer and old suits be best and presents more of a challenge when decorating. As I grow older, less is more and fewer but bigger things rather than a bunch of small things appeals to my eye and lifestyle.

I am absolutely drawn to antiques.........in the same way that I am drawn to German Shepherd dogs and thickets of trees and the smell of pine in the air and sunshine and crossing the border into Florida. Some things just have their appeal, you know? I can absolutely place the first time I felt a connection with antique furniture. I was maybe 7 or 8 and we were at a local flea market in the Central Valley. It was called (and still is called.....) Cherry Auction. There were endless tables of clothes and furniture and stuff. There were animal pens and a chicken house, and dairy cows and pigs. There were lots of fruit and vegetable vendors. There was a beerock stand and a tamale stand and a sno-cone vendor. Farmers and ranchers came for the animal auction with a real auctioneer. Women came to buy vegetables for their table. People came to buy clothes and toys and shoes and furniture. That was my mom's deal. It was like the earliest yard sale ever. And as I walked down the long, long rows of tables (there were trees and shade and a ton of noise) I saw vendors with antique furniture. In my house, built around the 1920's, we had an old china cabinet and an old buffet that came with the house. My mom didn't love them, because they reminded her of the "old stuff" she grew up with on the farm in the South. But they were my favorite things in the house. And my favorite things at the auction. Besides the candy and the sno-cones and the beerocks. Why? Why do I like hanging moss but not topiary? Why do I like green but not purple? Why do I like my hair long?
My family had NO heirlooms. Not one lousy piece of anything from the past. But I like collecting my own pieces of the past. And I think about a time when I will get to meet the people who blazed the trails into California, and the people who made history and the people who lived during Bible times. Until then, I just like old furniture. And yes, the decades of the 20's and 30's have the most appeal. Even when I tour a really old house, I am not drawn as much to things from before the turn of the last century, as to the things of this one.

Red

As I looked around my house while thinking how to answer this, I almost laughed. There is nothing new, not furniture wise. Most pieces date back to the late 1800's or early 1900's. But then our house was built in 1868 and we have tried to furnish it period appropriate. But it is by no means a museum. Everything is used daily. So yes, I would have to answer that I love antiques and have for many years. Can't really say why, but I did find a soulmate as my DH feels the same way. We love antiqueing and going to auctions. We even drove 22 hours round trip, without sleep, to pick up a 1800's walnut parlor organ for the formal living room. It just seemed that the room needed one!

I must love old stuff. i grew up poor and we had old furniture - nothing I'd call an antique. but the love of the old has stuck. Maybe it's comfortable?

I often think I should have been born a century or so ago tho. I'm not a very modern person.

I don't think I have anything new - most everything i have now I inherited from my MIL. She came from a wealthy family and married into a wealthier family. She inherited from both families - then I inherited from her (my X didn't want any of it). I also love old houses. always have. and wouldn't ya know the first house I move into after getting married is ultra modern? ugh.

now that i live out west I have to add my 2nd favorite house - a sante fe/adobe type. better for me now (not that i have one) but stairs aren't my friends anymore!

I've hauled my stuff around in all of my moves (even across country).
If I need anything I usually look in 2nd hand stores or antiques shops. i really have no need for any more furniture tho.

I've always loved both antique and vintage.

My mother used to buy old pieces and either strip and refinish them or paint them shabby chic. This was back in the 60's and she was a decorator. She would, also, create furniture out of other objects. An ornate mirror frame would recieve legs and be turned into a bedside table or an old piano bench would have a third of its top sawn off to provide a space for a live trailing plant in its reincarnation into a coffee table.

In one of our homes, she refinished an old round DR table, shortened it, and used it as a coffee table, between two love seats, in front of our LR fireplace.

Well, "Yes," to just about all of Oceana's questions. I'm very attracted to the Edwardian period. Not so much the Art Deco and Art Nouveau styles, although I like them and would love a few good pieces as accents, but the solid, comfy-looking chairs and sofas. Somehow they just say "home" to me.

I like some Victorian furniture and accessories, but the overall look is just a tad too fussy for me. MidCentury Modern has lovely lines, but is just a tad too modern for me.

My grandparents lived in older homes and didn't change their furniture once they bought it, but their furniture was mostly from the 40's and 50's. However, they did have older pieces that had been their parents. And they were still good, so they were still in use.

My parents started off with almost no money, so whenever anyone offered them a piece of furniture, they took it. So I grew up around some bits of 20's and 30's furniture.

Somehow, I've ended up in a house built in 1922. Not because I was deliberately looking for one, but because this was the place that said, "Here is home." Most of my furniture has been handed down from the family, and quite a bit of it is from the 20's and 30's.

Just last week, a relative offered my sister and me a lamp that had been a great-aunt's. I took one look at the twin downbridge lamp and knew I had finally found the floor lamp I need in my living room. But, to be nice, I let my sister have the first refusal. Thankfully, she didn't like it. I need to to a bit of cleanup and maybe some painting, but it's the perfect lamp. And my relative laughed and said that she knew I'd like the lamp--she knew it would go well with the rest of my things.

Once I realized that while I venture off on decorating tangents--the back porch is rather Shabby Chic, the bathroom is goodness knows what--I do tend to circle back to the Edwardian era, I started doing a bit of research on the furniture and the times. It's become a fun hobby for me.

Camlan said it perfectly, I think..."Somehow they just say "home" to me."

At this stage in my life, I am conflicted!
My frugal self says, buy things that hold value. I grew up in an old Southern city full of (and surrounded by, in the country,) fine old houses and beautiful things, and they look normal to me. I was raised to aspire to a fine house with a pedigree; acres of park, garden, and farm; and rooms full of lovely old things, although my own growing up, in the "reduced circumstances" typical of lots of Southern families, was piecemeal. We had what we already had, filled in when necessary by what we could afford and wht landed on us as the elderly relatives joined the choir invisible.

I gave up that aspiration when I realized that, to get the house, I'd have to marry it. Families keep them, or did when I was young, and none of those boys were the ones for me. I rejoiced in that decision as I saw too many of my friends enslaved by the care and feeding of those lovely piles, and the social responsibilities that go with them. You are never the owner; you are the custodian. Not how I wanted to live.

My conflict now is the growing desire to avoid maintenance, and those lovely things require it for their preservation. I have a few fine old family things. My tastes are simple and definite, and most of what is available new is not for me. My husband's tastes are simpler and more modern than mine, and he dislikes anything shabby or weathering. We've accommodated our differences by choosing things that appeal to us both. Each of us has absolute veto power over anything we really don't want to live with. You could call our house a kind of domestic Venn diagram...

On some days, i dream of a whitewashed room, a linen shift, a bench, a mattress, a plate, a cup, a spoon...

So I think we are headed for a kind of beach house/mountain cottage simplicity, but the pull of fine 18th century English and American furniture will likely never leave me altogether.

...Somehow they just say "home" to me.

To me too! I love antiques. There's just something so very comforting and warm about their timeworn presence. The patina that years of living brings seems to imbue an antique piece with a life of its own. It was there. It "witnessed" the daily lives of others who have long since gone before me, and to me, that means a lot.

My mother used to drag me "antique-ing" when I was a little girl, and I think that's where I developed my fondness for the old stuff. Oh, not at the time -- at the time, I recall hating going from antique shop to antique shop in search of treasures, but it definitely became a part of my own makeup over time. I don't go out searching for things often at all anymore (no room, no money!), but I don't think I'll ever lose my attraction to and desire to live with antiques.

I seem to be more of a vintage girl and I love stuff from the 20's - 50's for the most part. Most things tend to be very well made, I like the idea of recycling and it fits in with my more casual cottage life style.

Yes to all of the questions.

I have always been utterly entranced with antiques and history. I grew up reading stories from E. Nesbit and Enid Blyton -- full of descriptions of old homes and castles. Look at how vital descriptions of homes are in stories like "Lord of the Rings" or "Wind in the Willows" or "Wuthering Heights" or "Rebecca" or "Pride & Prejudice" or even "Dracula" or "Frankenstein" or even old detective novels or classic science fiction novels. Even old fairy tales or Westerns!

I can remember travelling to Scotland to visit my grandma -- who adored old rugs ("rrrrooogs" as she would say! LOL!) and china. She haggled with sellers at local fairs and from the "boots" (trunks) of cars ..... tinkers and gypsies ...... and went to many auctions .....

DH and I have spent many happy hours digging through dusty back corners of antique shops and waiting at auctions!

Jan at Rosemary Cottage

I too am drawn to old things. I always feel that I am saving them from being lost. I have no special era but when I see something I just know I have to bring it home. I can identify with the credit card run amock LOL> I have a mish mash of things...some heirlooms....a chair that my great x3 grandfather made and then all the pieces that are made of salvaged material as well. I know when my Mom and Dad emptied my Grandmother's house my Mom said..." you don't want all that old stuff !" and gave it away....pie safe with punched tin doors...iron beds...wardrobes..I got a chamber pot and a pitcher...sigh...I have always loved old stuff. c

While I own quite a bit of old furniture, only my dining room table really counts, as it's a Shaker piece (the chairs are repros). But what I really want is a Pilgrim era chest. I'm not drawn to most "early American" furniture, but the idea of owning something made in the 1600s just fascinates me.

Here is a link that might be useful: Brewster Chest

Yes! Antique and vintage. I bought my first antique, a spool bed at 16, and it is in my guest room now. The only new furniture in my house is the upholstered pieces. I like the 'warmth' of older pieces and have some eBay and CL accessory finds that I rotate out by season. I always look for vintage or antique and prefer buying them, and fixing up them up if needed, over buying new.

If you mean "true" antiques---before 1909, No because I don't like the "classics" in furniture at all (Hepplewhite, Duncan Phyfe, etc.), & only occasionally a Victorian piece...if it's both unusual & Rosewood.

I do like "Vintage" furniture & accessories from the 1920ties, 30ties & 40ties, & would love to have an original mohair sofa & chair from that era.

I too love antiques and have a few from the family and a few I've picked up along the way. I love old pine chest of drawers, seems like you can use them in any room and I do!

Ideefixe I just had to comment on The Brewster Chest. It is beautiful and can see why you are drawn to it. My husband's family is actually related to Elder Brewster and their roots are in the town of Brewster on Cape Cod. Unfortuately we haven't seen any of the old pieces.

Someone gave me my first antique at age 21. It was a small blue transferware platter and I still have it. And after that the antique monster was created, grrrrrr.

Jane, I remember buying my very first antique when I was about 18 years old. It too was a blue transferware platter - very old, from England. It even felt good to hold in my hands. Oh, how I wish I had it now, but alas, I think it ended up with my ex. ::sigh::

I'm drawn to MCM furnishings for two reasons. The memories they evoke and they're built to last out of solid wood. Often Walnut, which I love love love.

I appreciate fine antiques but my real love is for OLD STUFF - I'd rather have primitive things; old chairs, old rugs, old dishes that people have used and loved. Fine antique furniture is beautiful, but I want to see the evidence of the people who've used it for the past decades.

Teacats! Another E. Nesbit girl? I though I was the only person left who ever heard of The Bastable Children. My copy has all three of the books in one volume, it's falling to pieces, and I will never let it go.

bronwynsmom: Loved her books! My fav was The Five Children and It; The Phoenix and the Carpet - and the The story of the amulet.

Have you read all of the "Look Insides" on her books at Amazon? It is amazing to read how many of the "adventures" mirrored actual political happenings in the world at the time (like the Dreyfus case) and to read how many famous authors are so familiar with her works .....

Jan

Teacats: I'm glad you reminded me of the boot sales. I went to a boot sale in Ascot outside of London when my sister lived in England. I found the most incredible buys! So many that I had to leave some at her cottage until she moved back and had them shipped with her things!

Newdawn: I was given my first antique at 15 or 16 when my grandmother gave me the steamer trunk that she came over with to the US when she was 5 years old in 1898 from Italy! It is beautiful and the antique store lady next door, helped me restore it. Years later, we visited Ellis Island and there is a pile of those trunks on display...I saw many that looked just like mine; probably not anything of great value, but great sentimental value to me and family history that is priceless!

I love these stories in this thread.

Teacats....one more thing....my sister's cottage in Pinner (suburb of London) was called "Jasmine Cottage". It was formerly the buggy barn of the incredible estate house on this property. I believe the owner of the property is a barrister (?) (Not sure that's the right term) but we would see him leave for the courts with his white curly wig in his hand! What an interesting place. Their home was full of antiques!

My Scots GREAT grandma's china: (pronounced "aye, well here's the bits and pieces of chhEnneee")

And here's my grandma's china:

Jan at Rosemary Cottage

Love the first pattern, Jan.

Yes, yes and yes. I am very drawn to old pieces. I only have a few "new" pieces and they have patina. Made to look old things. I only buy vintage or antique accessories. I use family things when/where I can. Mom has told me to come go through a few drawers - can't wait.

It was confirmed by an astrologist that I have an "old soul." I think that's part of the reason, if not the reason, I am drawn to things with history. I'm a big toucher when shopping antiques. I love running my hand across the top of something or picking it up for closer inspection. I often wonder who owned items before me and what it has witnessed. Imagine my horror of being raised by a furniture store family! lol I started buying old pieces at 21yo and had a few older family things in my room as a teenager. The home I was born into was 50s Danish, but I loved visiting my 90yo next door neighbor's home and was fascinated by her antiques.

We moved to an English Tudor when I was 10yo and it fit my decorating personality. I like English things, but don't try to decorate in English. Def. eclectic, to fit what I am drawn to and feel good around. I love the coolness of Swedish, but would never decorate my home that way. I need warm colors/items. Texture is a must. I'm a very visual person. Could never live in a modern home (I do enjoy seeing) but would not be comfortable in one on a daily basis. Touches of French are okay, but I'm not into ornate pieces from any style.

Another aside to teacats...I loved Five Children and It and The Story of the Amulet as well. Thank you for the Amazon tip.

YES!! I love old things. Sometimes I think the older the better. We have quite a few really nice things. We go to auctions and my husband is as bad as I am. I am drawn to old/antique chairs. And sometimes others have no idea how to clean up the grunge!
I am really drawn to the primitive things we find too.
And I love oak...
Also painted items as well.
We have a very eclectic house.
Karen L

I went to my first outside auction when I was 4-5 & I fell in love with antiques & auctions; 55 years later both still fasinate me. About 20 years ago, I bought the ultimate antique - an unrestored, falling down Greek Revival house from 1858. I have yet to regret anything about the decision, but most people don't understand the thrill of living in an old building nor do they see the charm of an accurate restoration.

Aunt Jen don't you wish you could get that old transferware platter back from your ex?

Oh Angeldog going through that trunk had to be a wonderful feeling. And your sister's cottage sounds absolutely magical, like some old black and white movie. Does she still live there?

Jan I love your grandma's orange and white bone china, how beautiful and precious.

Antiquesilver do you think one day you will show us your house from the outside? I know some people don't like to put their house on the internet but I hope you will one day before we are all old and gray.

.....Jane

Newdawn, I'm already gray, LOL. This is a photo taken before last Christmas (leaf pickup day judging by the lack of vehicles) - I don't worry about posting a photo because it looks like hundreds of others up & down the east coast. I had a better shot but I somehow deleted it while putting it on PhotoBucket.

My Ultimate Antique

I'm popping my head back up after being away from the boards for a while. (working on my new native garden) I've been catching up on folks by reading old messages and then trying to figure out where to jump back into it all. This seemed like a good place to jump.

I so adore antiques and wish I had a house much larger than I do so I could collect more. Actually what I probably need is a couple of houses so I could do them in different styles. I am drawn to French furniture with legs but am graduallly getting rid of a lot of it so that I can make the place a bit more inviting to other folks.

I like the sense of history that comes with filling up the house with things that other people have used. It just makes it feel more homey to me than buying something brand-new which is so much like what everyone else has.

I've been a thrifting junkie since I was a little kid. My grandmother's lodge would have an annual rummage sale and all the stuff was stored in the basement of the house across the street. I always got first dibs. Rarely was I allowed to bring home furniture but glassware and dishesa and old jewelry were okay.

When we bought our house a couple of years ago we went looking for antiques to furnish it. With the help of craigslist we've done just that.

Hope to be more active here again in the future. I still have that blasted weird living room to work out.

I love antiques because they hold so many stories. None of my furniture is new except the couch and DH's recliner!
I have lived with homemade or antique furniture all of my life, and it is quite soothing to walk through the house and know that each person that I have loved is still represented. I loved Bronsynsmom's "joined the choir invisible"...most of my family is in that choir, but having their belongings around me makes me feel loved, provided for and "at home".

This is a rather delicate question for me...

I look for things that are contemporary with my house.

My house was built in the year in which I was born, so I don't like it when people refer to those things as "antiques."

Like okmoreh, I look for things from the era of my home too! I don't much like fussy things. I have always been drawn to the Arts & Crafts era and some primitives.

My favorite antique is a very large Gold Rush Store sign that hangs over my large fireplace. It says "F. T. Tinker" in huge letters. Underneath it says "Violin Maker and Repairer." It's black metal background with white letters and a red border. It has an old wooden frame and is 7 feet long and 2 1/2 feet tall. It's old looking but in great shape. We took it to get appraised at an antique appraisal fair but no one there knew anything about Gold Rush era items. :(

DH loves Asian antiques, primitive pieces made without nails, screws or glue. "Mortice and tendon" pieces made from elm wood with old paint. LOL! Mostly those pieces live upstairs.

I recently find myself appreciating some mid century modern pieces and look for ways to incorporate them but without much luck. Maybe in my next life. LOL!