Collecting Design, Objects, Books and Editions: The Same Rules Apply
For a long time "the collection" meant the art, and everything else in the house was furniture. That line has been disappearing for a while, in my own home and in my clients', and I have stopped pretending it exists. A collection is everything you chose to live with: the paintings, yes, but also the chair, the lamp, the signed catalogue, the edition on the shelf. All of it has a market, a history, fakes, condition issues and a right way to buy. And all of it deserves the same care.
How I got here
Three things happened at once. My own collecting drifted toward design and objects, because that is where I kept finding things I wanted to live with. Clients started asking for help with pieces that were not art: a pair of chairs, a lighting piece, a book they had seen at a fair. And the younger collectors I met were not starting with paintings at all. They were starting with art toys, editions, books and sneakers, and building serious collections before they ever bought a canvas. The art world was slow to take that seriously. The market was not.
Design furniture and lighting
Named designers, vintage and contemporary, have a market as developed as any artist's, with the same questions. Is it an original production or a later reissue? Which manufacturer, which years? Has it been reupholstered, refinished, rewired? A licensed reissue is a fine thing to own, but it is not the same object as an original, and the price difference can be enormous. Provenance matters here exactly as it does for a painting, and condition matters more, because furniture gets used.
Art toys and editions
A vinyl figure or a sculptural edition by a well-known artist is a real work in an edition, and it trades like one. The edition size, the colorway, the release, whether it was bought at retail or on the secondary market: all of this sets the value, and the fakes are good. These are also the pieces that get bought on hype and sold in a panic. The ones that hold up are from artists whose wider practice holds up.
Books and catalogues
Exhibition catalogues, artist's books, signed and numbered editions, catalogues raisonnés that have gone out of print. Books are the most undervalued category in collecting, the easiest to start with, and the one where condition and completeness matter most: the slipcase, the dust jacket, the print that was issued with it. A first printing with everything present is a different object from the same title without.
The mistake that costs the most
With art, the costly mistake is usually buying the wrong thing. With objects, it is throwing away the right things. The box, the receipt, the certificate, the shipping label from the artist's studio, the original packaging: for a design piece or an edition, these are a large part of the value, and they go out with the recycling in the first week. Keep everything that came with it, record it, and store it with the piece. A figure in its sealed box with the receipt and a figure loose on a shelf are not the same asset.
One collection, one standard
This is why I treat objects exactly as I treat art: research before buying, provenance and condition checked, paperwork kept, every piece recorded. Not because a chair is a painting, but because the person who bought both chose both, and the collection is the whole of it. If yours has grown past the walls and nobody has written any of it down, that is a familiar place to start. Get in touch.