There’s a great 4 storey antiques emporium near us, and its one of my 7 year old son’s favourite places to go and browse around. Each floor is packed from floor to ceiling with everything from vintage clothes to old china, furniture and fascinating random old things. It’s like a treasure-trove and it’s a great place to spend a few hours, although I must admit the customer service there is *rubbish* which totally puts me off.
It’s run by the kind of people who think they’re doing you a favour by selling you stuff, so we don’t actually buy things from there very often…
When we were looking around the other day my son came across these 2 vintage postcard albums, and instantly fell in love with them and the idea of collecting postcards. They could only be bought as a pair (even though they don’t match and look like they’re from completely different decades) so he paid for one and I bought the other.
The long one is art-deco style and I’m guessing maybe 1930s – can you help us date them?
The label inside the tall Art Deco album
The inside cover of the album with hand-painted flowers on the cover
Actually, the one you thought was 1930’s may be even earlier than that. I would put it at about 1910 or 1912. Is there any publisher information on it anywhere? The art and typography look like it might be one from Volland, perhaps. Those birds are featured on artist-decorated cards from the heyday of art postcards – which was from about 1900-1918. Some elements which we like to think of as art deco actually are from the arts and crafts era. I think the floral one might perhaps be a little older.
Hi Joyce
That’s really helpful thanks! I’ve added a couple more photos, one of the inside page of the hand-painted album, and a label I found on the inside of the tall ‘art deco’ style one. I think it reads: ‘Swan’ fountain Pen Depot, J. E. Beale, The Fancy Fair, Bournemouth
I love them!
AMAZING!!!!
Thanks – I’m really pleased with them!
Wish I had some just like those, I have tons of postcards sitting in drawers.
They’re lovely! Great finds!