Collectors descended upon Cochrane this weekend to feast their eyes - and get their hands - on a vast array of highly collectible turn-of-the-century glass items. “I've never seen a collection this big before.
Collectors descended upon Cochrane this weekend to feast their eyes - and get their hands - on a vast array of highly collectible turn-of-the-century glass items.
“I've never seen a collection this big before. It's unbelievable, ” said Marce Renner as she browsed a room filled from floor to ceiling with highly sought-after carnival glass.
“I love the different varieties and colours … they're gorgeous. ”
Saturday morning, Renner lined up in the cold with other excited fans outside a home in West Valley, eager to be one of the first to have their pick of more than 300 pieces of carnival glass being offered at a contents sale in West Valley.
When the doors opened at 9 a.m., she and a handful of collectors made a beeline for the second floor, where hundreds of antique iridescent vases, plates, butter dishes, candle holders, aperitif glasses and more were displayed on shelves, each with price tags ranging from $5 to more than $100.
“I had to go. You don't see 300 at a time, ” said Tracie Lambert, who drove from southeast Calgary to take part in the sale and quickly scooped up an ornate bowl with a peacock and grape design, along with some teacups. “I have lots. I just like it because it's really pretty. ”
“I'm just drawn to them, ” said another woman as she carefully loaded more than 25 vases into a cardboard box. She drove from Nanton with her two kids and wasted no time nabbing as many of the collectibles as she could muster.
“It's just a little obsession, ” she said with a smile.
Carnival glass was created between 1907 and the late 1920s as a more affordable knock-off to the expensive Tiffany glassware being made at the time. The moulded, colourful pieces - both decorative and functional and known for their “oil slick ” style finishes - got their name because they were often given away as prizes at carnivals, grocery stores and movie theatres.
Now, it's one of the most traded items in the world - with 2,000 different patterns like Peacock Tail, Cattail and Wreath of Roses blended with 50 shimmery shades, including root beer, clambroth and horehound.
As for Renner, she was on the hunt for perfume dispensers to add to her personal collection.
“These were all originally given out at gas stations, ” Renner said, as she happily held up a marigold-coloured antique she snagged from the shelf. “I like the old bottles. ”
Saturday's sale was organized by Sell My Stuff Canada area franchise owner Marcy Norman, who runs across all manner of surprises in her profession, given it's her job to help sell possessions of people who have died, or are downsizing, divorcing or dealing with health changes.
She said she was blown away when she first laid eyes on the unnamed Cochrane couple's collection of carnival glass. The largest she'd previously seen was about 60 items.
“It was a bit overwhelming - I had never seen that much, ” Norman recalled. “For a whole collection to become available is a very rare thing. It's so beautiful … it's the most phenomenal collection. ”
Although Norman couldn't identify these clients' specific circumstances that led to the selections being sold, she did say the couple had a love for every piece.
“They were just avid collectors. Everywhere they went they bought pieces, through the United States and Canada, ” Norman said. “She was a very passionate collector and she also researched it a lot. ”
There are a ton of tricks and rules to finding the most valuable and tradable pieces of carnival glass - at the sale, people in the know held up bowls and plates to a window in the room to see if the base might change colour in the light. Others looked for differing details like leaves and lines that would give away the rarity of an item.
Because the myriad of small distinctions can make the difference between a $5 and a $500 price tag, Norman brought in two appraisers to properly assess the value of each piece. They meticulously went through the collection over a six-hour period before the sale.
“That collection was just amazing, ” said Wilf Blanchard of TQ Antiques, who helped Norman itemize the acquisition. He also had never seen such a substantial stockpile. “When I first saw it, I thought, ‘Oh my God.' ”
Blanchard said certain pieces of carnival glass, called Vaseline, even have heavy marigold iridescence, making it glow in a black light. A serious collector will carry a small black light of their own to confirm a piece is indeed of the intriguing kind.
“I think the way the glass is made, it just draws you, ” he said. “I find it really cool. ”
When the sale concluded Saturday afternoon, most of the collection had been sold to fans, traders and people who just saw a piece and were emotionally drawn to it.
Norman said the thing she loves most about carnival glass is that it's not only beautiful, but for many, it also evokes a memory of a bygone era.
“What I hear from a lot of people is, ‘My grandmother had carnival glass,' ” she said. “There's a lot of nostalgia. ”
