Sorting Through the Often Confusing World of Antiques

 

QUESTION: Every time I go into an antique mall, I become overwhelmed by all the items. Booth after booth of what seems like junk. Yet I know there must be some interesting and perhaps valuable antiques hidden there. How can I make sense of it all?

ANSWER: Perhaps your mind and senses have gone into antiques and collectibles overload. So many items—bits of furniture, pottery, piles of old jewelry, dolls, old Coca-Cola signs, and things that look like the cat dragged them in. So where’s the good stuff? 

It all seems so confusing. And the prices for some items seem ridiculous, especially if you’re a beginning collector. But don’t despair. There’s a method to all that antique madness.

Generally, antiques fall into two categories—those of the real world and those of the  rarefied one that most people can only ooh and aah at. And T,V. programs like The Antiques Roadshow, Pickers, and Pawnstars haven’t helped matters. In fact, all of them have brought the world of antiques to a world-wide audience. No longer are antiques in the realm of the rich—the realm of the “Don’t touch that.”

But antiques and collectibles can be broken down into manageable categories.

When most people think of antiques, they think of furniture. And although furniture makes up a good percentage of antiques out there, smaller items, known as “smalls” in the antiques business—ceramics, glassware, silverware, toys, and commemorative items—all play important roles in the overall history of modern culture.

All in all, there are about 15 major categories and 75 sub-categories. Within these there are other, more specialized areas, such as antique musical instruments and automobiliana, two very specialized categories.

Even though antiques can be categorized generally, dealers and serious collectors use historical periods—Jacobean, Colonial, Victorian, Civil War, Western and Retro—to sort things out. Often, these terms also indicate different styles.

For instance, in the world of furniture, you’ll probably see examples of English, French, and American styles in most antiques shops and malls, as well as at antiques shows or auctions. Most English furniture falls into historical periods such as Jacobean,  pre-Victorian, or Victorian while American furniture tends to fall into different types according to region of manufacture—New York, New England, Pennsylvania, or Southern. 

Porcelain or pottery pieces tend to fall into categories associated with the country in which they were produced—England, Germany, France, United States, China and Japan. The four you’ll see most are English, German, Japanese, and American. You’ll soon become familiar with names such as Royal Doulton, Staffordshire, and Meissen, Blue Willow, Limoge, Belleek and Sevres, especially if you frequent the better antiques shops and shows.

Glassware is the third most popular category. You’ll see all types, including Depression, Venetian, English, and Bohemian glass. Most glassware collectors specialize in a particular produce line–bowls, tumblers, decanters, etc. There’s also a refined category known as art glass in which you’ll find all those pretty vases blown in amberina, peach blow, and ruby.

Silverware is also a very popular antique. Here again, English, German and American silverware predominates. Like glass, product type defines this category. Collectors actively seek teapots, candlesticks, flatware, and bowls. Classification in this category is by make and markings generally stamped on the back of the products. Sterling and Sheffield silver are the two most recognizable types. EP is often seen as a marking and stands for silver Electro Plate. Sheffield silver is a combination of a layer of silver and copper beaten together to give a silver surface with a warm sheen.

Next up comes clocks and watches. This is a very popular general category, particularly among men, who seem to like the mechanical nature of timepieces. English, French and Austrian clocks dominate. In the "Longcase," or pendulum grandfather clocks, the English manufacturers stand out with the value of the clock being as much in the beauty of the cabinetry as in the mechanical workings. A beginner should get familiar with clockmakers names such as Thomas Field, McCabe, and Japy Freres. The same applies to watches. Names like Hamilton, Seiko, and Waltham are popular with collectors.

And finally there are collectibles, which cover everything from blue willow patterned ceramics, which are popular with women, to the war medals popular with men. Just remember what a collectible is. It is an object of limited supply, gathered or accumulated for pleasure or as a hobby. A very trendy category, collectibles nevertheless have basic product lines, such as ceramic plates, perfume bottles, pocket watches, stamps, and even figurines that continue to grow year after year.

These are just some of the main categories of antiques that you can begin to collect. While some tend to be higher priced, you’ll find plenty of small pieces of furniture, ceramics, and glassware to get you started in collecting.

To read more articles on antiques, please visit the Antiques Articles section of my Web site.  And to stay up to the minute on antiques and collectibles, please join the over 30,000 readers by following my free online magazine, #TheAntiquesAlmanac. Learn more about railroad antiques in "All Aboard!" in the 2021 Summer Edition, online now. And to read daily posts about unique objects from the past and their histories, like the #Antiques and More Collection on Facebook.

NEXT WEEK: We’ll take a look at some of the specialty categories of antiques and collectibles. 

Glassware for the Rich and Famous

QUESTION: My mother was extremely proud of her good glassware and china, which originally belonged to her mother. She would lovingly take it out of her china closet for each special holiday dinner. Boy, how those glasses did shine. I’ve always wondered about what type of glassware this was. My grandmother particularly liked cut glass, and these glasses—water goblets, wine, champagne, etc—had delicate floral designs cut into them. Some told me that they may have been made by the Seneca Glass Company, but I’m not sure. What can you tell me about this company and the glassware that they produced?


ANSWER: From the photo you sent, I can definitely tell you that your grandmother had fine taste, for these pieces are definitely by Seneca Glass. By the early 1920s, the company offered a new line of deep-etched glassware. Your grandmother’s pieces most likely were in this group.

In 1891, a group of immigrant glass artisans and businessmen from Germany's Black Forest region settled in Seneca, Ohio. Seeking to take advantage of the opportunities available in the American glass market, they purchased the former Fostoria Glass Company factory and established the Seneca Glass Company, named after the county where the factory stood and the local Indian tribe of the same name.

But the lure of cheap natural gas, free land, abundant quality glass sand within easy reach, and a city subsidy was too much to resist, so the owners moved the company to Morgantown, West Viriginia. in 1896. They kept the name and over time, the firm
developed a reputation for creating some of the finest lead crystal glassware available anywhere.

Embassies used it, Eleanor Roosevelt bought it, and Americans with finer taste and a pocketbook to match loved it. Seneca produced quality, delicate, mold-blown glassware in a wide variety of forms for the next 86 years. It became known for its striking cut glass patterns. Some of the patterns were so complex, they took an experienced cutter 12 hours to complete. Later years, company owners boasted that Seneca had more than1,000 cut glass patterns available.

Popularity grew quickly as the word got out in social circles. Large-scale retail stores all over the country began ordering Seneca products. Over the years, Seneca Glass received orders from B. Altman's and Tiffany's in New York, Marshall Fields and Company in Chicago, Neiman-Marcus in Dallas, the Ritz Carlton Hotel in Boston, and the Sheraton Palace Hotel in San Francisco. Philadelphia's highly regarded John Wanamaker Department Store, placed an order for 218 dozen glassware items, all cut with the crest of the president of Liberia which the company planed to sell him for his executive mansion.

Not to be outdone by private organizations and foreign powers, the U.S. State Department ordered Seneca crystal for 30 American embassies and consulates in 1944 and 1945.

While searching for glassware for a special occasion, Eleanor Roosevelt chose stems in an obsolete Seneca pattern, being sold at the reduced price of 25 cents each. These she chose over patterns offered by the store's staff from famous firms, expensive glassware items priced in excess of $50 a dozen. Mrs. Roosevelt used her bargain Seneca glassware at a State dinner held in honor of England's King George VI.

Mrs. Roosevelt wasn’t the last person associated with the White House to order Seneca glass. Ladybird Johnson purchased peach champagne glasses in Seneca’s Epicure pattern for Vice President Lyndon Johnson. Each glass had the vice president's initials, LBJ, and an Open Road Stetson hat, her husband's trademark headgear, etched on it.  Jacqueline Kennedy also used Seneca glassware in the White House.
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Today, Seneca glassware is highly prized and actively sought by an ever-growing group of collectors with impeccable taste.

Seneca’s glassware was handmade and mold blown. Glass blowers produced such glassware by first gathering a small, molten blob of glass on the end of a hollow pipe or rod. By plowing through the pipe and manipulating it in certain ways, a glass worker would pre-shape the slowly cooling, glowing mass. The blower then inserted the pre-shaped "gather" into an iron mold—a mold that a skilled Seneca artisan had produced. Blowing into the pipe forced the hot glass to conform to the shape of the inside of the mold.

Depending on the specific object being produced, several operations could follow. For example, on stemware, the molding of the stem and foot might be done with forms and paddles or an intricate stem might be produced using a mold. Once the glass worker formed an item, he annealed or reheated it and allowed it to cool gradually and uniformly to avoid uneven cooling that would shatter the glass in an oven called a lehr. Other workers would then send the cooled object on for finishing, including the removal of excess glass, grinding and polishing.

One glass decorating technique, the “optic,” directly involved the shape of the interior of the mold itself. The interior of the mold could be shaped in panels, pillars, spirals, swags, and other interesting shapes. These shapes become part of the shape of the body of the glass formed in the optic mold. Seneca used this technique to create a variety of pleasing optics.

Seneca also produced wares decorated with needle and plate etchings and sandblasted decorations. Artisans also used other decorative techniques, including banding and metallic decorations. While elegantly cut lead crystal would be what came to consumers' minds first when they thought of Seneca glass, the company did offer a variety of colored glassware. The quantities of colorful glasses and tablewares available fluctuated over the decades, reflecting changes in public taste. Colored glassware would be offered in larger amounts during the later years, beginning around the 1960s.
   
Some of Seneca's specific glassware forms included goblets, sherbets or champagnes, cocktails, oyster cocktails, sherries, wine glasses, clarets, and cordial glasses classified as "stemware;" ice teas, hi-balls, old fashioneds, juices, and water glasses grouped as "tumblers;" along with a variety of decorative glassware" or "artware," including bowls, candle-holders, and vases.

 To read more articles on antiques, please visit my Web site.  And to stay up to the minute on antiques and collectibles, please join the other 18,000 readers by following my free online magazine, #TheAntiquesAlmanac. Learn more about the Victorians in the Winter 2018 Edition, "All Things Victorian," online now. 

The Mystique of Cobalt Blue

QUESTION: I’ve always loved objects made of cobalt blue glass. The shimmer of the deep blue glass as the sunlight filtered through it used to fascinate me as a kid. So it’s no accident that I began to collect various glass objects made of it. But even though I have a modest collection of glasses, pitchers, vases, and the like, I really don’t know much about cobalt glass. Can you please give me some background on it and perhaps tell me what’s really collectible and what isn’t?

ANSWER: Cobalt blue glass offers something for everyone. It’s color is distinctive and the variety of pieces available is great. People often associate cobalt glass with 19th and early 20th-century medicine bottles, as well as ink bottles. But the number of different objects made of it goes well beyond these two mundane things.

The addition of a small amount of cobalt to molten glass turns it a deep blue. Its use goes back thousands of years. It was the Egyptians who first developed a process to color glass using impurities found in raw materials. The Romans copied and perfected this method. In Mycenae, around 1400 B.C.E., the production of cobalt glass reached its peak. The large amount of jewelry and dishes made of cobalt blue glass found at archaeological sites show how popular it was. However, today’s collectors look to more recent times and the glass objects made during the Great Depression.

While not all cobalt glass is Depression Glass, a lot of it is. This is the most fertile area for beginning collectors because so much of it appears on the market. Besides being known as “cobalt blue,” Depression glassmakers also referred to it as Deep Blue, Dark Blue, and Ritz Blue.

Depression glass collectors particularly like to collect the Royal Lace Pattern, made by the Hazel Atlas Glass Company in the 1930s. They continued to produce this elegant pattern until 1941.

Many companies created Depression-Era cobalt glass. In the late 1920s, the Diamond Glassware Company offered cobalt blue pieces in the Victory pattern. Hazel Atlas Glass Company introduced cobalt blue glass pieces in its Aurora line, New Century, Florentine No. 1, Florentine No. 2, Hairpin, Ships and Sailboats, and Starlight. The Fenton Glass Company added cobalt blue glass to its Lincoln Inn pattern. The Moondrops and Radiance patterns by New Martinsville Glass Company provided cobalt blue pieces. Paden City Glass Company's offered cobalt blue glass pieces in their Orchid and the Peacock & Wild Rose patterns. Westmoreland Glass Company showcased cobalt blue glass in the English Hobnail line. Everyone, it seems, got in on the act.

Many companies also made beautiful cobalt blue glassware for more formal dining and entertaining. For example, Morgantown Glass Company created a line of elegant glassware in the Golf Ball pattern. The Cambridge Glass Company, on the other hand, created glassware with overlay designs.

Many companies have produced eye-catching decorative items made of cobalt blue glass. During the 1940s and 1950s, the Fenton Glass Company, of Parkersburg, West Virginia, began including cobalt blue glass pieces in its line of eggs and slippers as well as baskets. Another company that created distinctive looking slippers and other decorator pieces was the Degenhart Glass Company. Animals in every shape and size have remained popular with collectors. The Imperial Glass Co. was only one of many companies producing animals in cobalt blue.

Avon Products Inc. took advantage of the popularity of cobalt blue glass and offered a variety of items, including cruets, cologne bottles, and salt and pepper shakers, to its customers over the years, To reach those looking for more elegant items, Avon had the Fostoria Glass Company, long known for its quality glass, produce glassware in the George and Martha Washington pattern.

Lastly, some people collect cobalt blue glass kitchenware, including mixing bowls, rolling pins, refrigerator boxes, and measuring cups, produced by well-known glass manufacturers.

While some people collect cobalt glass for its value, many collect it for its beauty, especially when displayed in a window so the sunlight can shine through it, giving the room a mystical blue glow.

Mother Nature’s Gift to Glass

QUESTION: My mother loved decorative glassware. She died recently and left me her collection. While some pieces are older, most date from the 1950s and 1960s. I particularly like several vases that look like flowers. Do you know what they are called and tell me a little about their history?

ANSWER: Back in the 1950s and 1960s, many women collected decorative glassware. Most of the pieces came from Fenton Glassware, but several other manufacturers also made a wide assortment of vases, candy and butter dishes, ashtrays, and the like. Many of these feature hobnail decoration. The vases you’re asking about are known as Jack-in-the-Pulpit vases.

To glass lovers the name "Jack-in-the-Pulpit" has become synonymous with glass vases styled to imitate a wild flower. This flower is native to some parts of the United States, but this style of glassware originated in England, where no jack-in-the-pulpit flowers don’t grow. Most likely, this design came from the adaptation of a similar wildflower found in England known as Lords and Ladies.

Like the flower, a glass Jack-in-the-Pulpit vase consists of three parts, a base, a stem and the trumpet. The trumpet is the large flared top which gives the piece its style, much like the trumpet forms the flower on the plant. The stem connects that trumpet to the base, much like the stem connects the flower to its root. Trumpets vary in style, from flared, rounded trumpets, to those with pinched and twisted points in the front and the back. Some trumpets, particularly those by Fenton, have a raised back and dip downward in the front.

Some collectors believe Louis C. Tiffany created the first Jack-in-the-Pulpit vase around 1900. But that isn’t the case. The first known Jack-in-the-Pulpit vase appeared in 1854, a good 40 years before Tiffany’s vases. The style of the early English Jack-in-the-Pulpit vase even more closely resembles the flower. However, English glassmakers at the turn of the century didn’t name their pieces, unlike their American counterparts. Instead, they just gave them a pattern number.

English Jack-in-the-Pulpit vases came from a number of makers, including Thomas Webb & Sons, Richardson's, Webb-Corbett and Stuart, plus many small companies. Some smaller firms subcontracted work out to finishers, so it's possible that one firm decorated the blanks of another. British glassmakers did, however, blow most of their Jack-in-the-Pulpits.

Prices for British Jack-in the-Pulpit vases range from $75 for a piece which can’t be attributed to any particular manufacturer to several thousand dollars for a rare Webb or Stevens & Williams piece. Rare pieces can command $2,000 to $3,000. On average, British pieces go for about $175.

While decoration doesn't seem to have a effect on the price of unattributed British pieces, it does effect the prices of the higher-end ones. Size and the decorations, such as applied glass chainwork, vary. Companies produced vases in opalescent patterns such as spiral optic and   cranberry, and some come in the various colors like Beaded Melon.

Fenton’s Burmese vases are particularly popular with collectors. The company also made decorated Jack-in-the-Pulpits in other types of glass. Fenton decorated white and off-white, called cameo satin, blanks with scenes sell for around $75.

Other noteworthy American producers include Northwood/Dugan, Imperial, Westmoreland, Mount Washington and L.G. Wright. Northwood made jacks in various colors in Carnival glass, a short marigold version being the most common. But Northwood and Dugan also made them in opalescent glass. These generally sell for under $100 apiece.

Born Again Glass

QUESTION: I’ve recently started to collect colored Victorian glassware. But the more I get into it, the more confused I’ve become. On more than one occasion, I’ve been sold pieces produced in the 1960s that the dealer insisted were authentic. How can I tell the difference between the real thing and reproductions and downright fakes?

ANSWER: You’re not alone. The antiques world has become swamped with imitations and fakes. Imitators pray on the ignorance of many dealers, especially those in the lower end of the market selling at fleamarkets. Most of these dealers sell whatever they can buy at a reasonable price at garage and house sales. Others sell on auction sites like eBay. Just because a dealer feeds you a line about the authenticity of a piece of glass doesn’t make it so. In fact, unlike other forms of antiques, glass is particularly susceptible to scams because most of it shows no maker’s mark.

The demand for colored Victorian glassware continues to increase, causing the prices for it in some cases to skyrocket due to supply and demand. Most colored, Victorian glassware is now highly collectable. Therefore, copies and imitations have increasingly appeared on dealers’ shelves and tables.

This trend seems to have begun during the 1960s and has continued until today. You’ve already noticed the confusion at antique shows, shops, malls and fleamarkets. So if you intend to get serious about collecting Victorian glassware, then you must be able to visually separate the old items from the new and not-so-new. This means wading through the imitations, reissues, copies and reproductions until you find the real thing.

Dealers add to this confusion by intermingling glassware from the 1930s through the mid-1980s with older pieces. And just because a dealer seems to specialize in antique glassware doesn’t make him or her less suspect. Most collectors and dealers are nonspecialists, and therefore make buying and selling errors. The bottom line is that you equip yourself with the knowledge of the type of glassware that you want to collect. An educated collector is a wise one. This is the only way you can be assured of purchasing authentic pieces. So how can you do this?

Numerous national glass organizations promote details about their particular category of glassware. They track and report on the various reproductions and look-a-likes in their newsletters and Web sites. From these, you can acquire considerable knowledge in a relatively short time.

The worst culprits are the reproductions, reissues, and copies produced in the 1960s and early 1970s. It’s especially hard for those, like yourself, who have entered the glassware field in the last decade. One company, L.G. Wright Glass Company of New Martinsville, West Virginia, stands out among others.

Beginning in the late 1030s, Wright began buying up old glass molds from closed American glass factories. And this is the rub with glass. Unlike other antiques, makers produce glassware from molds as well as blowing. One of the biggest inventions in the 19th century was the discovery of the process to make molded pressed glass. Generally, molds are durable, so if a maker today can get their hands on some old ones, they can essentially produce the same pieces from the original molds. Glass can also be blown into a mold, a process used to manufacture items like lamp shades and water pitchers.

Instead of making the glass himself, Wright contracted with glass houses such as Fenton, Fostoria and Westmoreland to reissue glass using his molds. He then sold the finished pieces to various dealers, jobbers and wholesale outlets. Many of these glass patterns ultimately found their way into various antique shows and shops throughout the country. If marked at all, the glassware usually just had a paper label. Once the label fell off or was removed, dealers could represent these reproductions as authentic pieces to unsuspecting collectors like yourself. Now that 30 to 40 years have passed, many of these reproductions have acquired some wear, which adds still more to the difficulty of identifying them as reproductions or look-a-likes of the Victorian patterns.

While few reproductions can pass as authentic when placed side by side with original pieces, few collectors have the opportunity to do so. Fortunately, you can find a lot of information in books and periodicals and online that will help you identify the fakes.

Look for the following when trying to tell the difference between the real thing and a fake or reproduction:

1. Find out if possible if the pattern you wish to collect has been reproduced.
2. Feel the glass. Old glass is generally thicker and thus heavier than newer glass.
3. Look for signs of wear, usually scratches on the bottom and perhaps tiny chips on edges and rims.
4. Old pieces show a more defined, detailed pattern than newer ones. The more glass manufacturers use a mold the softer the edges become.
5. Look for ground off rims. This indicates either a newer piece or an old one that was so badly chipped that it needed to be ground down—especially salt and pepper shakers.
6. Be wary of maker’s marks that have been etched into the glass. Makers of older pieces either had no marks or used paper labels.

The Ultimate All-in-One

QUESTION: My grandmother had a cabinet in her kitchen which she called a “Hoosier.” She told me her mother left it to her and now I have it in my kitchen. What can you tell me about it?

ANSWER: The modern kitchen with its microwave, glass-topped stove, side-by-side refrigerator, and granite countertops is a far cry from your great-grandma’s kitchen. The most modern thing in her kitchen was her Hoosier, an all-in-one preparation and storage unit that brought her convenience and practicality.

Named after the Hoosier Manufacturing Co. of New Castle, Indiana, the Hoosier cabinet was to become one of the most popular pieces of furniture to hit the American market. Though there were other companies in Indiana that made them, Hoosier Manufacturing built over four million of these special cabinets between 1900 and 1940. Until 1920, the company made and finished their new all-in-one cabinet in natural oak, but as the third decade of the 20th century progressed, they began to offer Hooisers with white enamel-lined drawers. Because of the bright white of the enamel, people called them “White Beauties.”

When the Hoosier first appeared, American homes didn’t have built-in storage cabinets. Soon housewives demanded something in which they could store their baking supplies and equipment, as well as give them an additional work surface. The company quickly adapted the 19th-century baker’s cabinet, a piece of furniture they were already making, to fit the needs of the modern housewife. These existing cabinets featured a work surface to roll out and knead dough, a few cabinets above, and  “possum belly” drawers below to hold flour and sugar. Manufacturers of these baker’s cabinets made the drawers from tin to protect their contents from rodents. At first, they made the work surface of wood, then later employed zinc, aluminum, and porcelain enamel. They attached casters to the legs, both for ease of moving and to keep ants out of the cabinet.

By rearranging the parts of the baker’s cabinet, Hoosier Manufacturing came up with a well-organized, compact unit which answered the housewife’s needs for storage and working space. The company added to these cabinets many improvements, including flour sifters, bread drawers lined with enamel, cutting boards, and an assortment of storage containers, to help the homemaker.

The typical Hoosier cabinet had three sections—a bottom section, featuring one large compartment with a slide-out shelf and several drawers to one side, a top portion only half as deep with several smaller compartments with doors, with or without windows, and a large lower compartment with a roll-top door that could be closed to hide various tools and equipment. Hoosier joined the top and bottom of the cabinet using a pair of metal channels which served as the guide for a sliding work surface, which usually had a pair of shallow drawers attached to its underside. The cabinet, with its work surface retracted, was normally about two feet deep— double that when pulled out—while the cabinet stood nearly six feet high.

A distinctive feature of the Hoosier cabinet was its accessories. Most came equipped with a variety of racks and other hardware to hold and organize spices and various staples. Some came with a hand coffee grinder and a combination flour-bin/sifter, a tin hopper that a housewife could use without having to remove it from the cabinet. Some contained a similar bin for sugar.

To hold a variety of spices and other staples, Hoosiers came equipped with special glass jars, manufactured by the Sneath Glass Company, to fit the cabinet and its racks. Original sets of Hoosier glassware consisted of coffee and tea canisters, a salt box, and four to eight spice jars. Some manufacturers also included a cracker or cookie jar. Some Hoosiers had elastic straps attached on the inside of their doors behind which housewives could place cards with such information as measurement conversions, sample menus, and household tips.

Manufacturers marked their cabinets with an identifying label which was often engraved or stamped onto metal, then screwed onto the front of the cabinet. Some glued paper labels on the back of the cabinet. Both types often disappeared as a result of refinishing.

Though Hoosier cabinets remained popular into the 1930s, they began to fall into disuse as soon as home builders equipped new kitchens with built-in cabinets and other appliances. Today, Hoosiers, dating from 1900-1910, sell on eBay for $500-$2,300. Later models sell for as little as $200.

The Often Confusing World of Antiques

QUESTION: Every time I go into an antique mall or visit a show, I become overwhelmed by all the items.  How can I make sense of it all?

ANSWER: If you’re like this person, perhaps you’re mind and senses have gone into antiques overload. So many items–furniture, ceramics, pictures, jewelry, old Coca-Cola signs and things that look like the cat dragged them in. So where’s the good stuff?

It all seems so confusing. And the prices for some products seem ridiculous , especially if you’re a beginning collector. But don’t despair. There’s a method to all that antique madness. Believe it or not, there are some main categories.

When most people think of antiques, they think of furniture. And though it makes up a good percentage of antiques out there, smaller items, known as “smalls” in the antiques business--ceramics, glassware, silverware, toys, and commemorative items–all play important roles.
All in all, there are about 15 major categories and 75 sub-categories. Within these there are other, more specialized areas, such as antique maps and posters, two very specialized categories.

Even though antiques can be categorized generally, dealers and serious collectors use historical periods–Victorian, Roman, Gothic, Civil War, Western and even the1950s–to sort things out.
Often, these terms also indicate different styles.

For instance, in the world of furniture, you’ll probably see examples of English, French, American, and Chinese styles at most antique malls, shows, or auctions. Most English furniture falls into the pre-Victorian or Victorian category while American furniture tends to fall into different types: Pennsylvania, Shaker, New York, etc..

Porcelain or pottery pieces fall into categories associated with the country in which they were made–England, Germany, France, American, Chinese and Japanese are just a few. The four you’ll see most are English, German and Japanese, and American. You’ll soon become familiar with names such as Royal Doulton, Staffordshire, and Meissen, Blue Willow, Limoge, Belleek and Sevres, especially if you frequent the better antiques venues.

Glassware is the third most popular category. You’ll see all types, including Depression, Venetian, English, and Czech glass. Most glassware collectors specialize in a particular produce line–bowls, tumblers, decanters, etc. There’s also a refined category known as art glass in which you’ll find all those pretty vases blown in amberina, peach blow, and ruby.

These are just some of the many categories of antiques that you can begin to collect. While some tend to be higher priced, you’ll find plenty of small pieces of furniture, ceramic, and glassware to get you on your way.