: The volunteers of Brandywine River Museum presented the 33rd
Antiques Show on May 29-31. On Friday evening, May 28, a special
preview party for the antiques show was conducted. Antiques show
committee chairman MaryEllen Perri was assisted by a staff of
more than 350 volunteers under the leadership of volunteer
coordinator Donna Gormel.
All show proceeds benefit the Brandywine River Museum Volunteers'
Art Purchase Fund.
Thirty-two dealers from across the nation were again assembled by
Robert Armacost, show manager. The dealers presented a variety of
American and English furniture, Oriental and European porcelain,
silver and bronze, folk art, paintings and handwoven carpets.
Thomas and Julia Barringer, Stockton, N.J.
The entire facility of the museum except the two Wyeth
galleries, plus the first, second and third floor galleries, was
used to accommodate the exhibitors. The lower level held eight, the
second floor had another eight and the third floor had nine. The
courtyard open stalls held the "lucky" seven - for it did not rain
Friday evening this year.
Accompanying the antiques show was a special exhibition, "Extreme
Creamware: Surprising Forms and Diverse Decorations." This
exhibition featured approximately 50 pieces of creamware
predominately from the Eighteenth Century that display unusual
forms and demonstrate wide variety of decorations. The Brandywine
Museum owns only one of the pieces in the exhibit. All of the
others were lent by friends of the museum.
Originally known as cream color, creamware was inexpensive and
durable and it boasted a smooth surface and brilliant glaze
perfect for ornamentation. Creamware is attributed to Enoch Booth
of Staffordshire, England, and was first introduced around 1740.
The majority of the dealers have participated from the first show
on down to the present. Among the returning exhibitors were
Autumn Pond Antiques from Bolton, Conn., David Morey of
Thomaston, Maine, Kemble's Antiques of Norwich, Ohio, and
Campbell Antiques from Baltimore, Md. New to the show this year
were Irvin and Dolores Boyd Antiques from Fort Washington, Penn.,
specializing in Eighteenth and early Nineteenth Century American
furniture, with a focus on cupboards, desks and chests.
Thomas and Julia Barringer, Stockton, N.J., one of the "lucky
seven" and dealers in Eighteenth and Nineteenth Century brown
wood, featured a pie safe with original red paint and
extraordinary tins, circa 1830-1840, plus two E. Moran drawings.
With only 12 exhibitions on their card, some consider the
Barringers outlanders. In the next stall Charley Horse Antiques,
Ruth Glen, Va., brought a Philadelphia, circa Eighteenth Century,
chair. Charley Horse has done this show for at least ten years.
Tucker Frey Antiques, Woodbury, Conn.
Robert D. Winter, Ltd displayed an oak Welsh dresser with
shell inlaid cupboards, circa 1765. Anne and Ron Klinger,
Philadelphia, brought both English and American furniture. Featured
was a large grouping of Eighteenth and Nineteenth Century silver,
plus a Satsuma bowl, circa 1890, and a Chester County high chest.
Oriental handwoven carpets by the tens could be seen in the booth
of Lawrence Forlano, Franconia, N.H., and Hanes and Rusking, Old
Lyme, Conn., had a good 75-inch-tall Queen Anne highboy from New
Hampshire.
The painted mid-Nineteenth Century Dutch cupboard with smoke
decorated doors offered by Country Lane Antiques was worth a
second look. One of the few tall-case clocks seen at the show was
offered by Irvin and Dolores Boyd, Fort Washington, Penn.
The 2005 show is scheduled for May 28-30. For information,
www.armacostantique shows.com or 410-435-2292.
