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Building antique reproductions (adaptations, for the most part) has opened many doors for me over the past 20 years. I’ve been inside great homes, met interesting people and have had the occasion to visit many antique shops and study fantastic pieces of furniture. But what I experienced a couple weeks back is something new and something I won’t soon forget. Here’s a taste. 
This cigar box is full of period hardware. It’s impossible to count the pieces, but I did find an escutcheon in that box – one of three boxes we had the opportunity to paw through – that nearly matched the piece I used on the Bible box in the October 2010 issue of Popular Woodworking Magazine. When I found the escutcheon, the shop owner handed me a complete matching period pull. The pull, dated from around 1730, is shown below.
Anyone care to venture a guess as to the cost of that pull if you wished to add it to your furniture project? Leave your guess as a comment, if you will.
There’s more photos and information to come before I give you the who,what and where information.
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depends on where you purchased it from, could be a buck to a few hundred, I would assume you got this from someone who knew what they had and if the other cotter pin mount is good, $125. have a few like that but not many have lots more of the victorian and later 1,000’s
$300? Does that mean I win because my guess was the closest?
Jonas,
I don’t own the box but the owner, his children (and by extension their children) will always know exactly what the cigar box is worth. For them, bits of history are a part of everyday life. And while the kids think their father is a crazy old coot, it isn’t (only) because he has the occassional cigar box loaded with William & Mary or Queen Anne brasses lying about.
And like Joe, I’m not telling either. I’ll leave that, and the rest, for Glen.
My box doesn’t contain stuff that is quite that age (at least I don’t think so), but it is cigar boxes in general I am afraid of that will get thrown out. Not by the owner, but when the woodworker moves on to the eternal workshop, then there is sadly a risk that the people who inherit the contents of the shop will look at a box and say hmm.. that looks like junk…
So it is definitely not an attempt to say that you have made a bad deal. I hope that you will make a beautiful piece to install the pull in.
And please enlighten us on the real price. greetings from Denmark.
Jonas,
No one is throwing that cigar box out, trust me but if you happen to have a box like that lying around…I’ll give you a five spot for every pull in it and I might even toss in a Benjamin to ease my conscience.
And Joe, if Glen doesn’t say it I will…no telling! 🙂
$5, stuff from cigar boxes should never cost more than that, even if they’re worth a lot more. It is better to get the things back into "circulation" than to keep them in a box for 30 years, until someone accidentally throws the box out.
I would expect that to be in the $150 range, priceless on the cool scale though.
John
I know, I know, but guess what I’m not telling!
Glen does the winner get to take home the prize if so then I’ll let the cat out of the bag
Joe
$200.05