Dear Readers, this will be a slow growing post beginning with the creation of a list of auction house names. Time permitting explanations will be added for many auction houses explaining why we included them on this list.
And when we say “Typical R. Lalique Collectors” we are excluding sophisticated and knowledgeable collectors with many years of collecting experience who may have already amassed large collections or been involved with R. Lalique for decades. Most R. Lalique collectors have a few to a few dozen pieces. They have bought things they liked, and are looking for opportunities to acquire more R. Lalique items that appeal to them. They don’t have the expertise of long time collectors because they don’t have the same level of experience in the collecting field. From our experience, many or most typical collectors are hoping that the items they buy will appreciate in value over time, and provide some kind of return on their investment while they enjoy their items as decorative objects.
Also, many of the places that we will refer to as auction houses, are just retail stores running online auctions as part of their marketing strategy. Also, some are just people in an office so there is no store, AND no live events. So it’s not just places that have a live auction that you can attend. For many of these “auction houses”, the only way to bid is online as they don’t conduct live in-person auctions. Finally as is always our position, if anyone has a problem with any information contained in the following list, we will cheerfully and promptly make an necessary corrections.
So enough with the chitchat, the first entry is a no brainer.
1. HERITAGE AUCTIONS – DALLAS TEXAS. Heritage is one of the largest auction houses in the world by total sales, and they may be one of the top five auction houses in the world when ranked by sales. Heritage is generally well respected. Unfortunately, Heritage has a history of offering fake non-R. Lalique items as R. Lalique. They claim their expert in the works of René Lalique is the leading U.S. authority! Here it is from their website: “He has held an annual exhibition and sale of Lalique glass hood ornaments at the Pebble Beach Concours D’Elegance since 1993, and is considered this country’s leading authority on the work of Rene Lalique.” So out the window go the ignorance and mistake excuses:). We’ve written several blog posts about the goings on at Heritage in regard to fake offerings, one of which got nearly $12,000 at one of their sales, and another of which is the bizarre Square Plate with the phony signature that is still on the Heritage website as we write this (Feb 21, 2024) looking for a sale, being re-offered apparently by the lucky winning bidder through some kind of re-offer program (pass the trash?) that Heritage has in place for those fortunate winning bidders.
2. GOLDFIELD AUCTIONS – WEISWAMPTACH LUXEMBOURG.
They had a blue fake Ecailles Vase coming up in their September 2023 auction. We notified them with all appropriate information and evidence that it was a fake. They went ahead and sold it anyway. The got €1980 for it according to their own report of the sale.
3. ACTIVITY AUCTIONS – DOVER DELEWARE
Activity auctions has a business model that if potential bidders knew what they were up to, they would have no bidders!
We aren’t sure what to call this place. Their business model appears to be as follows: Find Ebay auctions with brand name items. Take info from the Ebay listings including photos, and list it in their own online auction elsewhere at a higher price than the Ebay listing without of course mentioning that they do not have possession or ownership of the item they are “auctioning” off, or that it is available for less money on Ebay, or that they have no authority to sell the item. It seems you can just look at any item in any of their online auctions that appear in LiveAuctioneers, Invaluable, and Bidsquare, and just go to Ebay and pay less.
Assumedly if someone bids at their auction on LiveAuctioneers/Invaluable etc. and the bid is higher than the Ebay fixed price, they will then buy it from the Ebay seller if they can, and deliver it at the higher price to their winning bidder. What could go wrong 🙂
Basically it appears they are auctioning off things they do not have possession of, that they are not in control of, that they do not have on consigment in any way, and that they have no authority to sell because they do not own or have the item in their possession. Based on their apparent business model as described above, no one should ever buy anything from Activity Auctions as it seems it will always be cheaper going to the current owner and possessor of the item on Ebay. Obviously the bidders in their online auctions are not aware of the this information. And thinking about their business model, who would want to involve themselves with these people if they were aware of what they were doing? Nobody.
All Articles on These Topics: Articles of Interest to R Lalique Collectors
