Expansion of second hand market?

[iris lilies]

I've noticed here Millennials buying up brown furniture, sanding it down and painting it with chalk paint or whatever it is...stained to look like that modern farm look so popularized by Joanna Gaines. Anyway, that's what happened to DH's old buffet and dining room set.

Oh yes, the chalk paint trend is still going strong here in fly over country. Guess it is part of the still popular shabby choc look whoch has been going of for, what, 20 plus years mow? Reminds me of my parents trend in the 70s where everything was painted a kind of pinky red color or a dusty blue color and then “antiqued” with streaky beown stuff.

oh ugh.

Because there’s tons of brown furniture, I don’t mind the trend and especially it seems to be furniture made in the 30s that gets this treatment and I am less fond of 30s and 40s furniture. When they do it to a Victorian piece it makes me wince, but I know there are lots of Victorian pieces out there so it is not a great loss.

[rosarugosa]

I think it has always made so much sense to look at second-hand sources instead of bargain crap. I"m not particularly optimistic that people will rush to embrace this option now.

[catherine]

Oh yes, the chalk paint trend is still going strong here in fly over country. Guess it is part of the still popular shabby choc look whoch has been going of for, what, 20 plus years mow? Reminds me of my parents trend in the 70s where everything was painted a kind of pinky red color or a dusty blue color and then “antiqued” with streaky beown stuff.

oh ugh.

Because there’s tons of brown furniture, I don’t mind the trend and especially it seems to be furniture made in the 30s that gets this treatment and I am less fond of 30s and 40s furniture. When they do it to a Victorian piece it makes me wince, but I know there are lots of Victorian pieces out there so it is not a great loss.

I have an old Governor Winthrop flip-top secretary that was my great-aunt's and I'm hell-bent on keeping it. The problem is, it looks "old". Because I'm not that into the dark wood anymore, I was actually really attracted to chalk paint as a way to spruce up the desk and have it fit in with my quirky VT house. But to be honest, I'm a little reticent to do much to it.

It looks very similar to this: https://www.worthpoint.com/worthoped...sk-w-ball-claw

I'm a bit vexed that we bought the two wing chairs and they also have ball-and-claw feet. How do you dress that kind of furniture down?? My other furniture includes an old rustic farmhouse table and an Ikea gateleg table. I definitely am into eclectic, but I think I have to be a magician to make these pieces all work. It's like wearing a tuxedo jacket with ripped jeans.

[Chicken lady]

Booties.

[catherine]

Booties.

Oh, wow, what a cute idea!! Definitely goes with the Pee Wee's Playhouse vibe I've got going!!

[jp1]

Reminds me of my parents trend in the 70s where everything was painted a kind of pinky red color or a dusty blue color and then “antiqued” with streaky beown stuff.

oh ugh.

Your comment about antiquing stuff reminded me of my baby rocking chair. My father used this chair as a small child, and his father gave it to him when my sister was born, and both she and I used it as well. When Dad was a child it was plain brown with some sort of natural stain on it. Shortly after my sister was born and it was given to my parents by grandpa my mother, in a rare fit of creativity decided to stain/antique it into what it looks like now. (was this fashionable in the early 60's?) I never knew that it had once looked normal until after mom died and Dad confessed that he almost had a heart attack when he got home from work one day and Mom proudly showed him what she had been doing all day.

chair.jpg

[catherine]

Your comment about antiquing stuff reminded me of my baby rocking chair. My father used this chair as a small child, and his father gave it to him when my sister was born, and both she and I used it as well. When Dad was a child it was plain brown with some sort of natural stain on it. Shortly after my sister was born and it was given to my parents by grandpa my mother, in a rare fit of creativity decided to stain/antique it into what it looks like now. (was this fashionable in the early 60's?) I never knew that it had once looked normal until after mom died and Dad confessed that he almost had a heart attack when he got home from work one day and Mom proudly showed him what she had been doing all day.

chair.jpg

Your dad might have had a heart attack over it, but your mom didn't do a bad job, actually.

[iris lilies]

Oh, wow, what a cute idea!! Definitely goes with the Pee Wee's Playhouse vibe I've got going!!

That is funny and a whole lot more interesting than the typical “country” treatment of placing a ruffled skirt around the base of a chair to hide the legs.

[jp1]

Your dad might have had a heart attack over it, but your mom didn't do a bad job, actually.

To be fair, for what it is, yes, she did a good job. I've never found it cute. And would like it better if it were just a little brown rocking chair. But as it is, it's a happy memento from my childhood so I certainly won't be trying to change it back to it's original state.

Thinking about my mom's bits of creativity I can also remember a long gone paint by numbers "city at night" painting on black velvet that she had done shortly after my parents got married. They were poor at the time because dad was going to college and mom was supporting them by working as a seamstress at a fancy department store and she wanted to do something to make their crappy basement apartment seem more homey. (I suppose it was the 1950's budget version of today's popular wine and paint events that people do.)* This painting was the only piece of artwork on our living room wall until I was 8 or 9 years old. (20 years after she had painted it.)

*For the record, I've done one "wine and paint" event, as a thank you to some insurance brokers that had had an especially good year with my department a few years ago. It was tremendously fun despite the fact that I hated my painting because it had all the shortcomings I perceive in every painting/drawing I've ever done. Seeing all the variations of the same painting was great. One coworker in particular had made the clouds over the city into an ominous storm cloud that looked like a tornado was about to hit downtown San Francisco! I gave my painting to a friend and it now hangs in his bedroom hallway. Not quite the place of prominence that my mom's "city at night" painting had, but I'll take it. :-)

[Rogar]

Mid century modern, especially danish and Scandinavian, are popular here. My neighborhood is mostly 50's houses and there are even a few mid/mod stores with both used and new not far from home. However I think the small apartment trend due to high housing costs is lending to smaller furniture and more metal over wood.

As far as prices increases due to tariffs, I think most people will not bat an eye to paying a little more. There are obvious exceptions, but we are in a pretty rich economy right now and a lot of money floating around.