Gary Sullivan's Antique Clocks and Furniture Blog

Keeping Time exhibit on schedule

On September 23, 2013 in General by Gary Sullivan

We have been working day and night transporting musical clocks and installing the new exhibit at The Willard House & Clock Museum. This has been an all consuming process for the last several months, so if I failed to return your phone call or respond to an email, please forgive me. My antiques business has definitely suffered during this project and Matt is just as busy as I am. We hope to soon get back to locating great pieces and spending the proper amount of time working with our clients to place those things in the proper collections.

The exhibit is coming together nicely and most of the clocks are in the building. It is entitled Keeping Time, Musical Clocks of Early America and will include 38 functioning musical clocks (mostly American). The image is a graphic from the table of contents and really gives an idea of how amazing these clocks are. The exhibit will be open on Sunday, October 6th and will run only six weeks, until November 17th. The museum hours are Wednesday through Sunday, 10-4:00. Visit the Willard Museum for more information by clicking here

The amazing truth about hoarders

August 26, 2011 The popular new television shows on extreme hoarding have recently made more people aware of the problem. Because of this awareness, I’ve begun to hear comments such as, ”can you imagine seeing a place like that?” or “have you ever seen one of those houses?” The sad fact is, I have. Many times. It’s a lot more common than you might think. Between my work for various Boston area auctioneers in my youth and the years that I spent as an estate liquidator, I estimate that I’ve been involved in the dismantling of between 15 and 20 extreme hoarder’s homes. The difference is, I was usually dealing with the homes of hoarders who had either died or had gone to a nursing home. It would be unusual for a hoarder to part with their possessions, so antiques dealers are rarely called until after the occupant is gone. I used to attempt to explain the conditions of these houses, describing rooms piled with debris, sometimes up to the ceiling and only isles to walk through. Now people can see these ...
The Paris Time Capsule Apartment

April 24, 2013 A Parisian apartment left untouched for over 70 years was discovered in the quartier of Pigalle a few summers ago. The owner of this apartment, Mrs. De Florian left Paris just before the rumblings of World War II broke out in Europe. She closed up her shutters and left for the South of France, never to return to the city again. Seven decades later she passed away at the age of 91. It was only when her heirs enlisted professionals to make an inventory of the Parisian apartment she left behind, that this time capsule was finally unlocked. The team that had the honor of opening what must have been a very stiff old lock for the first time in 70 years, likened the experience to ‘stumbling into the castle of sleeping beauty’. The smell of dust, the cobwebs, the silence, was overwhelming; a once in a lifetime experience. There is a further twist to the story. In the apartment a painting of familiar style was discovered of a beautiful woman in pink. One of the inventory team members suspected ...
2014 recap blog

January 16, 2015 I looked at our last blog over the weekend and I was embarrassed to see that it was posted over a year ago. Well that is certainly not due to lack of effort. 2014 was the busiest year I can remember. Now we are headed into 2015, which will be my 40th year in the antiques business. It seems fitting that I start by recapping 2014 and highlighting some of those things which have kept Matt and I too busy to blog. Then I promise to keep up with events and maybe sprinkle in some “best of” stories from the past 40 years. The last blog was prior to the opening of an exhibit of Early American Musical clock that I curated at the Willard House and Clock Museum. The exhibit was a massive success. The clocks all played their music beautifully and it was impressive to see all these masterpieces together in one space. Thank you to all who participated. The catalogs are still available at the Willard House. You can take a video tour of the exhibit here. The ...
Accumulating fresh merchandise for “Antiques Week” in January

November 28, 2011 We have just acquired a few special items that will appear at the opening night preview party for the 2012 Metro NYC Show in January. If you are planning your visit to New York for the festivities, you’ll notice one major change in the Antiques Week schedule. There will be no 2012 TAAS Show, at least not by that name. In 2012, TAAS, also known as “The American Antiques Show”, also known as “The Folk Art Show” will live on in slightly different form. The venue has been taken over by The Art Fair Company and now goes by the name of The Metro NYC Show. It will be held at the same Metropolitan Pavilion location on on the same dates, as the TAAS Shows were. As in previous years, a preview party will take place on Wednesday evening, January 18th, with the show going from Thursday through Sunday, January 22nd. The core group of antiques dealers who previously did the TAAS Shows will return for this new show. A nice addition will be some exhibitors handling slightly more modern ...
Early American musical clock project in high gear.

July 11, 2013 It’s been a while since I have given an update on the progress of my American musical clock book and exhibit. Matt and I have been working nearly full time on the project for the past 6 months. Thus far we have visited and photographed about 70 clocks in private collections and institutions and have been welcomed with enthusiasm at each stop. What initially appeared to be a daunting task is proving to be quit rewarding. Due to the extraordinary cost of these rare musical clocks, the original purchasers usually chose exceptional cases that represent the very best examples of their period and form. Not only that, they preserve the recorded music of our ancestors just as they heard it 200 years ago. They have been likened to an original iPod. We have begun to gather the clocks that will appear in an exhibit at the Willard House & Clock Museum in North Grafton, Massachusetts. It will take place this fall from October 6th-November 17th and will include approximately 36 pre-1830 musical clocks. They will all be running and playing their ...
Highboy Rescue at Wyoming Auction

April 19, 2011 We have just purchased a “$650.” highboy for $60 thousand! Although I wish the numbers were reversed, I’m thrilled with the discovery and acquisition. Situations like this are what make the antiques business so fascinating and have certainly helped to hold my interest through the years. What happened is this: In mid February I received a letter from a panicked beneficiary of a trust, who informed me that several antique objects from her stepmother’s estate had been under-valued by an appraiser and were slated to be sold in 9 days by a remote Wyoming auctioneer. Fearing that the antiques would sell for a fraction of their value, she was bringing the auction to the attention of qualified dealers that she found on the internet. The key object, an eighteenth century Massachusetts bonnet-top high chest had been valued by an appraiser for the trust at $650. According to the heir, the high chest was a valuable Queen Anne piece and had been part of a fine furniture exhibit at the highly regarded Western Reserve Historical Society in 1969. She sent me an ...