vip in the city

Reduce, reuse, recycle

I think that my parents have become those people for whom “antique” is a verb. Neighboring New Jersey is dotted with antique coops — sort of like antique “malls,” where individual dealers set up stands under one roof to showcase their wares. But instead of The Gap and Starbucks, there are stacks of old books and displays of furniture and assorted knick knacks. Today we visited shops in the sleepy towns of Mount Holly and Somerville.

Is the impulse to go searching for treasures hard-wired in us from our hunter-gatherer days? People spend entire weekends tooling around and shopping for antiques; it’s probably a more pleasant experience when one is not operating on a couple hours’ sleep.

And though I’m forced to self-edit my possessions due to Manhattan apartment space constraints — and therefore I tend to finish these forays empty-handed — I do appreciate the idea of these old things, which in other contexts might be considered trash, being re-purposed and re-loved.

Tags: antiques, New Jersey