Federal Center Table, ca. 1790
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GUEST:
I bought this table in the early 1990s in a shop in downtown Toledo. Looked at it after work, I said, "That's an unusual table." Asked the guy how much he was asking for it. The guy was asking $800, he wouldn't come down. That's what I paid. When I saw it, I have to tell you, I looked at it...
APPRAISER:
They made these Baltimore-style tables in the 1880s, 1890s, 1900, 1910.
GUEST:
Okay.
APPRAISER:
So they were copies of the original tables. We have an oval table, right?
GUEST:
Right.
APPRAISER:
Veneer top, right?
GUEST:
Right.
APPRAISER:
With this wonderful inlay on the top edge right here coming over the edge. So you see that it's high quality because you have inlay... even this fine line here is inlay. When you come down to the skirt, you see it's a veneer skirt with really nice quality mahogany with fine inlay here, stringing in a panel pattern, and then pattern stringing on the skirt. The legs have graduated bellflowers, which are sandburnt to make them three dimensional. Then you come down to the cuffs. They're cuffed on all four sides. Many of them are missing, except for this back one here, you do have it fairly complete there. The good news is that you have a really fully inlaid table, a really high-style table. And if we could flip it over... We're going to try to figure out now whether it's first period or second period. Run your hand right there.
GUEST:
Okay.
APPRAISER:
What do you feel?
GUEST:
It's smooth, but it's still kind of uneven.
APPRAISER:
Uneven, right? You're feeling the plane marks from an 18th century plane.
GUEST:
Okay.
APPRAISER:
You have a period table from 1785 to 1795.
GUEST:
Okay.
APPRAISER:
Maybe 1800, so it's a real thing. Okay, let's put it back up and I'll give you a rundown. You paid $800.
GUEST:
Right.
APPRAISER:
I'm thrilled to tell you that a presale auction estimate on this table would be $8,000 to $12,000.
GUEST:
Not bad. That's good.
APPRAISER:
When you paid $800. That's great. That's at least ten times an increase.
Appraisal Details
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Value can change: The value of an item is dependent upon many things, including the condition of the object itself, trends in the market for that kind of object, and the location where the item will be sold. These are just some of the reasons why the answer to the question "What's it worth?" is so often "It depends."
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