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King City Antiques Fair Offers Best of Two Possible Worlds

by John Norris

All prices in Canadian funds

Shelagh Garland is a dealer in high-quality collectibles who operates out of her Toronto home. She also exhibits at shows. From April 23 to 25 she chose to exhibit, along with 47 other dealers, at Sam Halpern's King City Antiques Fair, about an hour's drive northwest of Toronto. The village—that's what it is and not a city—boasts quaint Victorian houses in the centre of farmland, some with stables of horses.

"I love this show," she said. "It's a pretty show. It's a cross between the Bowmanville show and the Downtown show. It's quite folky and also has some formal with the CADA [Canadian Antique Dealers Association]."

To the King City show she brought various quality collectibles for her tables and backdrops. For example, the weekend prior to the King City show, at a downtown Toronto flea market she'd purchased a folk art item of a barnyard scene of various wooden animals, a small shed, and even the farmer busy sawing wood in one corner. She refused to offer it for resale until it reached the King City show. Once there, it bore a fair $375 price tag.

Garland also brought her favorite folk art item, a life-size wooden owl frowning like Scrooge and perched on two books. Possibly European, it was designated, nevertheless, as American, dated circa 1900, and priced at $695. Yet another animal in her stable was an English oil of a horse named Toby. The painting was signed. She admitted, however, that "I'm just selling it as a decorative Victorian painting. I don't know whether the signature is legitimate or not." Hence she'd priced it at $750.

Barry Ezrin of the Joinery Shoppe, Moffat, Ontario, placed several key items as draws at the front of his booth. For example, a large wooden carpenter's workbench with black oil stains ingrained in it stood at the left. In front of it stood one of a pair of cement garden lions. They sold to a participating dealer, who bought them for his personal use. Also in front of the bench stood a Mission-style chair used to seat boys getting their haircuts at the Rockwood Academy, Rockwood, Ontario. The circa 1895 collectible was $895.

Ezrin's pi<138>ce de résistance was a Quebec—perhaps European—wingless angel suspended at the back of his booth against a dark blue curtain. The presentation of the piece smacked of baroque drama, as the angel's hands are held forth in a balletic gesture of greeting, almost as if she's going to burst into song at any moment. Priced at $4800, she was perhaps the most beautiful folk art item in the show.

Ezrin had competition for his serene angel. Bowmanville show dealers Phil and Jeanine Ross of O.C. Trading, Port Dover, Ontario, had brought their usual high-quality folk items. So, too, had Jim and Ilona Fleming of Three Peaks Farm Antiques, Wingham, Ontario. The Flemings also had exhibited frequently at the Bowmanville show until two years ago.

The Flemings hung colorful, bright hooked rugs on walls and stocked shelves and folky furniture tops with small carvings by some well-known artists such as Rentz and some by newcomers to the field. The dealers' unerring eye for quality was most evident in the bird carvings by deceased artist Chris Hikgendorff of Neustadt, Ontario. On opening night, the Flemings sold Hikgendorff's large mounted peacock in white and orange with brown spots, tail folded into a long trailing tube, for just $395. It's a superb piece of elegant lines and highly imaginative colors, applied, according to Jim Fleming, with the help of Hikgendorff's daughter. She sold all eight of her father's pieces to Fleming. Two of the birds in the collection Fleming made into lamps for the show.

Next to the Flemings' booth was Bowmanville show veteran Larry Foster of Stratford, Ontario. Early in the day on April 23 he sold a few items to fellow dealers. For example, Bowmanville show dealer Clay Benson bought Foster's large artists' store trade sign, offered weeks earlier at Bowmanville. Benson also bought other signs, probably to resell in the States. Foster also sold a black standing bridge lamp at $275 to dealer Jane Steiff. Moreover, he sold a circa 1910 tiered mahogany table to a participating dealer for the dealer's own collection.

"It was a steady crowd for the first two to three hours of the show," said Foster of the 1 p.m. opening, a time when only dealers and retirees (and perhaps the unemployed) can attend shows. "More formal items sold than country," he added. Foster later credited the sales difference to changing times. "There used to be a balance of sales of formal and country. Not any more. Young couples are now buying condos and want to furnish them with more formal decorative items versus trendy country."

For this show, Foster could now include in his booth Continental items. For example, he offered a green pail bench, circa 1880, for $575 and a smaller version in yellow with red trim at $375. Otherwise, his booth contained sports memorabilia and other smalls, such as a green candle box and folk paintings of sports activities such as boxing and hockey. He also brought a cream-colored open hutch, Quebec, circa 1840, at $4800.

Several dealers in formal furnishings, such as Bob Starr of Town of York, Toronto, and Sharon McLean of Belleville, Ontario, lined the aisle opposite Foster. The latter had sold at least five pieces of furniture by suppertime on opening day. One was a five-drawer desk, another a large two-door cupboard.

Textile dealer Carol Telfer of Stratford, Ontario, had sold very little by contrast. She, however, remained undaunted. "This is a show where you can sell something even on the last day."

One of the visitors to her booth and to Foster's was a collector, a retired teacher, who had driven all the way from Ottawa, Ontario. Said Foster, "She seemed excited to be here. She liked this show better than Bowmanville. She thought it had more variety, and you can move about the aisles."

For more information, contact Sam Halpern of S & A Events at (416) 498-8613 or e-mail antiqueshows@rogers.com.