Like it or not, signatures, tags, hallmarks, stamps and numbers matter when you’re talking vintage. This goes for a number of things – silver, glass (if you can find one on a glass item…good luck), furniture, clothes (obviously), figurines and so on and so forth. And nowhere is the hunt for a name more intense than in the field of costume jewellery.
Example: I recently saw a Lea Stein fox head brooch (brown and white, for those who are interested, which screams mid-1970s to me) with an unsigned clasp for sale on eBay. The price? US$19.99. Now, given that just about ANY Stein will have the trademark v-shaped ‘Lea Stein Paris’ pinback – and even really small pieces have a tiny, straight bar that reads ‘Lea Stein’, and these fox heads are usually signed – this low price is probably due to the seller expecting some (reasonable) suspicion that the piece is a fake. But there were several photos and a ‘Made in France’ sticker, and the thing did look genuine. Its signed value is probably anywhere between $60-$80 on eBay or similar, or $100-$120 retail.
What this goes to show is that signed pieces are usually going to sell for a higher price than their unsigned counterparts (unless the lack of signature is due to the piece being very early – and as there are so few signatures on really early pieces, the lack of one is never taken as a sign of mass-production or poor quality).
So given this thirsty hunt for a name, it’s highly frustrating when you have pieces that bear some kind of signature that you either can’t decipher or can’t get any information about. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by thevintagedetective
