The End of the Collector Mindset

[LizzieMaine]

The thing I'm more worried about is what becomes of the people who are forced out of their homes and their communities by the so-called "freedom" that only applies to those who can afford to pay for it. What I hope to live to see is the day when those people decide they've had all of that they're going to take, because when that day comes, I know where I'll be standing.

In the meantime, I'm grateful that my neighborhood's reputation for, shall we say, rambunctiousness, has up till now kept the gentrifiers away. The presence of a meth lab every now and then does tend to dissuade the "oh isn't this town quaint" crowd.

 

[Fading Fast]

I think that interest is a lot different, though, than it was in the '70s, when I was first roaming flea markets and second-hand stores. People in general weren't buying old stuff then for "investment purposes." They were buying it, as I was, to actually *use* it. Sure, you had the people who even then were speculating in comic books or bubble gum cards or other "nostalgia" stuff, but in general, a waterfall bedroom set wasn't a prized piece of deco-influenced High Thirties design. It was a cheap bedroom set for people who needed a cheap bedroom set, and that's where most of those sets ended up: in cheap bedrooms. A vintage coat wasn't a "vintage coat." It was an old coat you could get cheaper than buying a new coat. If you got a box of your grandmother's stuff out of the attic, it wasn't a sense of "oooh, it's dough, let's go" and scramble around for a Kovel's price guide -- it was, more often than not, stuff you could *use,* and you were glad to use it because it was cheaper to use it than to go to the store and buy the equivalent stuff new.

I think the collectors you see today are more in it for the bucks than for the practicality. The whole pickers-and-grinners-and-flippers phenomenon has come to dominate, and if nobody thinks it's worth money, well, hell, just throw it away. And the truth is, a lot of the stuff the Boomers are hoarding, the mass-marketed "collectibles" and trinkets and gimcracks, will never be worth anything in a dollar sense, so that stuff will be the first stuff tossed once the heirs realize there's no money in it. I come across "collectible plates" and unopened boxes of '80s baseball cards, and Beanie Babies, and all that type of stuff at the dump Swap Shop all the time. Once the "market" for this kind of stuff crashes, nobody wants any of it.

I agree with all of this with the caveat that I think some collectors today really love the stuff, but are also thinking about the investment value. Mnay of the people I've met at old book shows, for example, love the books first, but recognize the collectable value as well (some are all about the money).

But again, I agree with all above, just think there still is some subset of collectors who have a genuine passion for what they buy.

I don't have the money to be an "antiquarian book collector," so I buy the non-expensive second editions or second printing because I just love reading a book with a seventy year history (and maybe something interesting written here or there in it). I have a 100 year old copy of "The House of Mirth" that I paid $5 for (and is probably worth $5), but I love that it was read about the time the book was first published and has moved through many owners (and has some neat things written in the margin).

 

[LizzieMaine]

Some of the best books I have were found at that Swap Shop at the dump. It astounds me the libraries people will throw away -- sure, there's boxes full of cheap romances and airport-bookstand genre fiction, but there's also just about everything else anyone could ever want to read. I walked out of there one day with a hundred-and-sixty-year-old translation of New Testament-era apocrypha in its original binding, and spent a solid week immersed in it. The week after that I found a whole stack of review copies of various novels, how-to, and exploitation books from the late thirties, in original dust jackets, and I'm still working thru those.

Going to the dump is a highlight of my week because you never know what you're going to find. You might come away empty-handed, but the odds are very much against it.

 

[jamespowers]

The thing I'm more worried about is what becomes of the people who are forced out of their homes and their communities by the so-called "freedom" that only applies to those who can afford to pay for it. What I hope to live to see is the day when those people decide they've had all of that they're going to take, because when that day comes, I know where I'll be standing.

In the meantime, I'm grateful that my neighborhood's reputation for, shall we say, rambunctiousness, has up till now kept the gentrifiers away. The presence of a meth lab every now and then does tend to dissuade the "oh isn't this town quaint" crowd.

You would REALLY like Detroit then. Homes for $1 and it is NEVER going to get gentrified :

 

[Stearmen]

You would REALLY like Detroit then. Homes for $1 and it is NEVER going to get gentrified :

Unfortunate, that is what happens when you are a company town! We have seen this all over the Rust Belt. Now it is hitting the coal towns, and lumber towns, mainly due to automation. I worry about my city, over 50% of our economy is based on the military. If they decide to close a couple of bases, look out! On an ironic side note, we have a strong anti government, get of the dole community here.

 

[LizzieMaine]

You would REALLY like Detroit then. Homes for $1 and it is NEVER going to get gentrified :

What, no window glass? You got to knock it down to fifty cents, at least.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

There are two key terms that are relevant here: "Rare" and "Hard to Find." In my experience as a book dealer anything that's rare is hard to find but not everything that's hard to find is necessarily rare. A perfect example of the latter are non-fiction paperback editions of military history. While by no means rare they are hard to find simply because they're the kind of books that people hang on to and read over and over. And when they do turn up on the market they're quickly snapped up and out the door before the first speck of dust has a chance to settle on them.

 

[ChiTownScion]

My dear sweet wife harangues me continually about "collecting junk" centered around my hobbies, but she has her aspect of the same malady. If someone is throwing out a decent wood table, chair, or other furniture, she'll load it into the Odyssey, take it home, sand it, strip it, stain or paint it... and then give it away or utilize it here at home.

 

[dh66]

The problem with gentrification to me is that it's at heart, deeply insincere. It replaces a genuine community -- one made up of a cross-section of people from all classes and all walks of life with one made up of one class and one walk of life. Oh, sure, they puff and wheeze about "diversity," but in fact *real* diversity -- *class* diversity -- is the one thing that absolutely terrifies gentrifiers. That greasy old gas station on the corner might have been there for seventy years, but it's bringing down the property valuation. That weird second-hand store that's been in the middle of that downtown block since the First Hundred Days might be a neighborhood institution, but "my gawd, have you ever seen the kind of people who go *in* there?" Better to clear that stuff all out and replace it with "upscale restaurants," art galleries, boutiques, and the kind of fake Disneyfied diversity that people who say they couldn't live without diversity really mean when they talk about diversity.

The solution lies with gentrifiers really stopping to think about "community" as something other than the latest catch phrase they read about in the Atlantic. And with parasitical real estate developers and marketers being strung up by their ankles.

Late to the party here.......but this post is one of the truest statements I have ever read on TFL, or the internet in general.

Especially the last sentence.

 

[sheeplady]

I don't think false minimalism is a good thing. I know a lot of minimalists who aren't really concerned about consumer culture- they consume (many of them a lot) but it is not just plastic junk. Consuming $50 cocktails every Friday night is the same as consuming $50 in plastic junk from Walmart. You don't need the cocktails any more than you need the junk; if both are mindless then they are consumeristic. I think sticking to the adage, "I do experiences, not junk" only gets you so far if you are not mindful in your experiences. The $50 cocktail *could* be a Great Experience, but only if you are mindful. If you're just doing it to post it to facebook, it is keeping up with the Jones'.

I do strongly believe that people should focus on what makes them happy; and experiences and things that make you happy are *important* to consume. However, I see so many people (including young people) consuming mindlessly without focusing on how their stuff/ experiences make them feel. I think it is incredibly important that we live a mindful life and enjoy moments and things.

As far as my stuff, I actually hope my children take very little of it when I die. Things that they like- I want them to take that. I've made up boxes of pictures for them (including digital copies) and plan to save a few things from their childhood. There are a few "family" pieces I want them to take *IF* it makes them *HAPPY.* (A lamp, an old radio, a plant stand, and a vanity; I don't have much.) I want my stuff to go to someone who is made happy by it, and if that is not my children, I want it to go to someone that it does make happy. Almost everyone here has been made happy by an item that someone else passed over. I see nothing wrong with that.

I never want my child to feel that they have to keep something out of guilt. I think it is shameful to impose your tastes on your kid over stuff. My worst nightmare would be if they felt compelled that they had to hang onto most or every item after I died. I hope they sell my furniture/ house/ things and buy or do something with the money that makes them happy everyday. And if they give it to a charity and that makes them feel good, even better.

Once you give stuff away you lose control of it. If you cannot handle your item being broken, sold, used, or packed away; don't give it away.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

The problem with gentrification to me is that it's at heart, deeply insincere. It replaces a genuine community -- one made up of a cross-section of people from all classes and all walks of life with one made up of one class and one walk of life. Oh, sure, they puff and wheeze about "diversity," but in fact *real* diversity -- *class* diversity -- is the one thing that absolutely terrifies gentrifiers. That greasy old gas station on the corner might have been there for seventy years, but it's bringing down the property valuation. That weird second-hand store that's been in the middle of that downtown block since the First Hundred Days might be a neighborhood institution, but "my gawd, have you ever seen the kind of people who go *in* there?" Better to clear that stuff all out and replace it with "upscale restaurants," art galleries, boutiques, and the kind of fake Disneyfied diversity that people who say they couldn't live without diversity really mean when they talk about diversity.

In the '80s and '90s the downtown area of Fullerton, California was one of my favorite places to go. There were several used bookshops there that had been in business for years and it still had quite a few Mom & Pop businesses until the City of Fullerton decided that they wanted more trendy restaurants and bars there (it's just a few miles from Disneyland) because they can be taxed at a higher rate than other kinds of businesses. So now the bookshops are gone and downtown Fullerton is the DUI capital of Orange County. There had been a number of fatal drunk driving accidents there including one that killed Angels pitcher Nick Adenhart.

 

[LizzieMaine]

That's where my town is headed, and I hate it. If you don't drink, and I don't, there's nothing to do after the movie lets out at 9pm. Even if you just want to get a quick nighttime bite to eat downtown, you have to go to a bar full of loud, abrasive drinkers to do it. And when you do get the food it'll cost you fifteen dollars if it costs you a nickel.

I end up driving all the way across town to see the Clown or the Colonel rather than put up with that. I'd love to support a nice, quiet locally-owned open-late restaurant with no alcohol on the menu, but the foodies and the booze-lappers have crowded them all out.

Alcohol-fueled hit and run accidents are the latest big trend here, the most recent one being fatal. Yay progress.

 

[MikeKardec]

I've noticed some significant and hugely unfortunate changes in Los Angeles that are similar to gentrification but without the class aspect ... basically, wealthy neighborhoods are doing it to themselves and the outcome is good for no group. Individuals might benefit, but the community is not. A couple of examples: When I was a kid in the '60s and '70s, Beverly Hills was a town, not a tourist destination. Not that people didn't come there to see it but it was an entire functioning city. It has warehouses, small factories, obviously residential areas and the well known commercial center.

The commercial center was a LOT like small communities around the country. It had very upscale boutiques but also books stores, food markets, a functioning Central Business District and while it was clean and proud of it's wealth and prestige it was really just a little town serving the people who lived around it ... with services aimed at many income levels. Today it has become such an icon and property value has gone so high that it's a bit like a theme park of (though not necessarily FOR) the rich and famous (the real rich and famous, valuing their privacy, don't get out much in LA). There are still some of the old businesses left but I'm pretty sure that they are squeezed hard and probably own their buildings. As their existing clientele ages they will certainly all find it impossible to remain.

It's gross and unfortunate but it's successful ... the upwardly mobile model for the neighborhood worked.

The second example is Westwood Village, originally the campus town for UCLA. Same beginning to the story, affluent neighborhood yet a wonderful little commercial area, a downtown of sorts. Strangely, (or not so, seeing that movies have been favored by young people since their inception) it is a place that has always had far more theaters than Beverly Hills. But there were again, drug stores, markets, two camera stores, two book stores, gas stations, car mechanics, etc. In the 1970s it became the favorite entertainment spot for people from all over the city. More theaters opened. Like Beverly Hills it developed a "strolling" window shopping culture that built and built until, on a weekend night you could barely make it down the sidewalk. A complicated "cruising line" developed for cars cruising the Village. Rents soared, businesses changed what they sold to keep up with a younger and younger clientele coming in from all over LA to be part of the scene. Cheaper products at higher volume seemed to become mandatory. T-shirt shops flourished, there might have be ten of them at the peak. Soon the value of real estate went BEYOND what even the most profitable businesses could pay (I'm guessing this was because the run up was so fast that few businesses owned their own buildings).

Then the whole thing collapsed. Everything closed. Comparatively, it was a retail ghost town through the 1990s. Since then there have been many schemes to lure businesses and people back in reasonable numbers. It's never really worked. It's better off than it was but there is no longer a community OR true success.

In both cases a wonderful little town had it's character ruined for the residents and the people who regularly used it. That utility has never returned and probably never will. Oddly, in both cases you see really wealthy people losing control of their communities to their outside popularity and the the bubble turns it into something that no longer serves the residents. The pattern gnaws away at the top even as it destroys the bottom.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

Then there's the Church of Scientology who have their own very unique brand of gentrification. They buy up historic landmark buildings for use as "church" buildings and renovate them with the labor of their staff members who are only paid $50 a week. These "churches," which often bristle with surveillance cameras and are patrolled by security guards are open to church members only and to be a member you have to belong to their official association which costs thousands of dollars to join. Also wherever there are one of these "churches" there are nearby houses and apartment buildings which are also owned by the CoS as staff housing, particularly in L.A.

 

[HudsonHawk]

That's where my town is headed, and I hate it. If you don't drink, and I don't, there's nothing to do after the movie lets out at 9pm. Even if you just want to get a quick nighttime bite to eat downtown, you have to go to a bar full of loud, abrasive drinkers to do it. And when you do get the food it'll cost you fifteen dollars if it costs you a nickel.

I end up driving all the way across town to see the Clown or the Colonel rather than put up with that. I'd love to support a nice, quiet locally-owned open-late restaurant with no alcohol on the menu, but the foodies and the booze-lappers have crowded them all out.

Alcohol-fueled hit and run accidents are the latest big trend here, the most recent one being fatal. Yay progress.

We have lots of late night or 24-hour restaurants around here. Some serve alcohol, others don't, but none are what you'd call bars. When I was in college, there was a 24 hour place called Jaliscience, that served these massive burritos for $1. One was plenty to share for several people.

There was also the House of Pies, which was open 24 hours, and was the place where Buckminsterfullerene (or buckyballs) was first drawn out on a napkin, leading to a Nobel Prize in physics. Who says nothing good happens after midnight.

 

[Bushman]

The person who wrote this article obviously never stepped foot into my place. I barely have room in my closet because of all the stuff I collect! lol Masks (in fact, I have another one coming), vintage toys that filled my childhood, movie memorabilia, and (of course), hats! It'll be a real pickle when I end up moving into a house. I'll have to find one with a spare room to keep all my, as my girlfriend calls it, nerd stock.

 

[GHT]

Though the old photos will probably last longer than all the images stored on some digital cloud.

And you can't 'uplift' an old photo to create a spurious Facebook account, unless you have copied it onto your own account.

That's the main point for me. Digital history is evanescent. My mother has the family shoebox of old pictures, and it'll probably end up with me, but after that, it'll probably all end up in a recycling bin. Nobody else in the family particularly cares.

Vintage fairs are almost two a penny at the moment. Old black & white sepia photos fetch two or three pounds each, more for a particularly interesting one.

I have been forced to turn down some stuff from my parents that I'd love to have simply because living in Central London, I'll never be able to afford a house big enough to have a dedicated dining room, or space for an antique writing desk.

Depends how you define Central London. If it has an EC, WC, W and the lower end of SW, then yes you would have to have a substantial income to own a property big enough to be a hoarder. My previous home was a former warehouse opposite St. Katherine's Dock, within sight of Tower Bridge, but in Wapping. It was massive, and for those not familiar with London, Wapping is a district that has always housed the poorest of Londoners, it has been the place where immigrants first settle. I bought our old warehouse before the docks closed, before Canary Wharf was built, even back then it was expensive, but peanuts compared to the desirable districts of London. When the docks were turned into gated communities for the 1980's yuppies, all the properties around me were snapped up. Who would ever have thought that E1 would ever be gentrified? When we sold up, we moved to Wanstead, (I'm an East Ender, through & through,) my wife though, comes from the very posie Crouch End. There was enough from the sale to buy a small cottage in The New Forest, our retirement home, both our homes are stuffed full. Heaven knows what will become of our clutter.

 

[MikeKardec]

Then there's the Church of Scientology who have their own very unique brand of gentrification. They buy up historic landmark buildings for use as "church" buildings and renovate them with the labor of their staff members who are only paid $50 a week. These "churches," which often bristle with surveillance cameras and are patrolled by security guards are open to church members only and to be a member you have to belong to their official association which costs thousands of dollars to join. Also wherever there are one of these "churches" there are nearby houses and apartment buildings which are also owned by the CoS as staff housing, particularly in L.A.

A funny story ... their security may be more serious now than in the past: When I was a film school student in the 1980s a relative of a friend who was in the Church arraigned permission for us to shoot at the old Chateau Lysee, now known as the Scientology Celebrity Center. It was very nice of the friend and very generous of the Scientologists. I believe they had set up only a few days for our shoot.

Being film school students and only semi competent, we used up the time we had arraigned making mistake after mistake ... but we just kept coming back. For many weekends we shot. We would wait until people left their offices, shoot Polaroids of everything the way they had left it and then remove the entire contents of the office for the weekend, shoot our scenes and then "restore" them early Monday morning, using the Polaroids to get everything exactly back in place. We did notice that the "org" that ran the Center had changed (they do this occasionally) and the new people had no idea who we were except that we were there before they were. They accepted us without question. They never tried to proselytize us in any way and were both interested and helpful. We wrapped up, repaired some damage per their instructions and left.

Did we accidentally get inside their vaunted security or were they just really tolerant?

I have to say that the architecture of that beautiful building taught me as much about composition as many classes ... here's an old pic, I wish I could find some of our footage!

 

[jamespowers]

What, no window glass? You got to knock it down to fifty cents, at least.

:rofl: Even if you put glass in, it wouldn't last a week.

 

[jamespowers]

In the '80s and '90s the downtown area of Fullerton, California was one of my favorite places to go. There were several used bookshops there that had been in business for years and it still had quite a few Mom & Pop businesses until the City of Fullerton decided that they wanted more trendy restaurants and bars there (it's just a few miles from Disneyland) because they can be taxed at a higher rate than other kinds of businesses. So now the bookshops are gone and downtown Fullerton is the DUI capital of Orange County. There had been a number of fatal drunk driving accidents there including one that killed Angels pitcher Nick Adenhart.

I think you hit on the most important part with the Fullerton example.Local governments have thrown aside any idea of community or community building.It all comes down to tax money creation for them.If it doesn’t make tax money for them they don’t want it.
I had the same thing happen here when the local morons decided that they wanted to create a history walk and such through downtown----a historic downtown that they tore down and replaced with modern junk in the 60s and 70s.The local historical commission had a meeting that I showed up to and reminded them---what the heck are you going to protect?The 70s junk that replaced REAL historic buildings?!Then I found out that they literally wanted to “import” historical looking buildings from other places.They wanted to create a Disneyland fake Main Street!:doh:
That horse was far out of the barn and we ended it there.We still have a sham history walk though.“On this site used to stand a historic building that we replaced because the mom and pop store in it didn’t make us enough sales tax money.”Dumbasses!