The Score
On the weekend, Mr. Andrew and I went on an exercise walk. We made a plan to walk along the side streets to avoid people and the temptation of shopping. Along our route was a storage facility. As we approached, we noticed a pile of Free stuff on the curb. So naturally we had to investigate.
While the pile had been picked over, I still managed to find a few awesome things. The best find was this lamp with a gilded Thai statue of Rama as the base. A little online sleuthing suggests that the figure dates from the late 1940s or early 1950s. The lamp and shade seem to have been added separately. There’s a little metal tag wrapped around the god’s wrist but I can’t make out the mark on it. I’m trying to decide whether to keep it or sell it and if I should keep it as a lamp or separate the statue and the shade.
We were trying to solve the mystery of why this stuff was outside a storage rental facility. If TV has taught us anything it’s that people will auction of the contents of abandoned units. And there was plenty of treasure in this hoard. I’ve onlay pictured the things I could carry away but there was a Technics turntable and a lot of high end pre-1990s kitchen appliances. But I was drawn to things like this painted silk Moghul painting of a bridal procession. And the Moriyama porcelain plate, pictured below. It is marked “Occupied Japan” which would indicate that it was made in the 10 years after WWII. These objects indicate that the previous owner collected decorative objects from around the world. Did they get them as souvenirs from their world travels in the 1950s? Or did they prowl flea markets for vintage souvenirs? So many questions.
There was a realtor’s flyer attached to one of the boxes. Maybe somebody was moving stuff into storage and ran out of room and just ditched what they couldn’t fit in. But who was this person? There were boxes of wine and travel guides, the most recent dated 2003. The oldest, a guide to Southern Italy, was printed in 1930. It had lots of cool pull out maps so I took it. I also grabbed a very beat up National Lampoon book.
