Other hobbies and their fascination with "restoration"

Weiss

@ZoidMeister 's thread about Colorado silver reminded me of my Pike's Peak flask I found during the renovation of a 120 year old building back in 2010. It was one of many, many bottles I pulled from the several privies uncovered in the back half of the lot while we were pouring a new parking lot. Lots of early cork flasks, tons of embossed medicine bottles, and assorted interesting shapes, sizes, and colors. This is just a few:

I carefully rinsed the bottles. But many of the bottles had developed an opalescent, pearlescent sheen I wanted to preserve. You can get just a taste of it on the 1860s-era Pikes Peak flask.

It astounds me that something so fragile could travel nearly 400 miles by rail, wagon, or foot, during the Civil War era, get tossed into a privy, buried for 130 +/- years, and still come out completely intact.

But then come to find out that bottle collectors don't want earned patina. The vast majority, it seems, want their antique bottles to look better than the day they were made. They use strong chemicals and then tumble the bottles in various devices like shell tumblers, stripping off the patina to reveal virgin surfaces beneath.

Here's my flask:

And here's how the bottle hobby would have it:

There are several youtubers who hunt for bottles (my favorite is Adventure Archeology), but who then tumble them to make them look bright and shiny.

It seems that the antique auto hobby learned its lesson a decade or so ago: A car is only original once. When you restore it, you lose some of its history, personality, and charm. And the antique toy hobby is learning that lesson, too.

Are we dragging other hobbies, kicking and screaming, to recognize the authenticity of unaltered originals, or do you think we'll swing back around to join the others with shiny, polished coins eventually?

fastfreddie

Some collectables it is the norm to have them shiny and minty like silver serving sets. Glass may be another. Vintage watch values are stronger for original untouched examples. I personally like sweaty unrestored items.

ChangeInHistory

Good subject/post, Weiss. I've often thought about the similarities and differences between collectable fields and how they compare to the coin hobby/business. In my casual observations, it seems like the overall attitude among collectables is when possible or in doubt, leave the item alone/original.

It's hard to compare bottles, coins, marbles, and the like where if you do anything to it, you have to do the whole thing. As opposed to a car, a pinball machine or even a toy where you deviate from originality only partially- you can use a new piece here and there where you have to, but still have a high originality factor.

Maybe another factor is how the item is displayed. A bottle like that would be out on a shelf more than a coin, so originality may be less of a factor if it's more commonly displayed. From talking with my step mother about Barbies, generally original is better, but there are plenty of times where the doll needs some repair or restoration. Those collectors often put their dolls out on display, and the stained original dress just doesn't work for them. How about functionality- you want that pinball machine to be original, but it has to work as well - originality may be negotiable in order to make it playable.

Lots of interesting angles and comparisons. I'm looking forward to the replies to this post.

coinbuf

Things move in cycles, not that long ago the majority of coin collectors wanted coins to be bright and minty fresh, hench the long lines at the dip jar at shows. Now some collectors (not sure if it is the majority) are into crusty semi original looking coins. I say semi original because a dirty crusty coin is not how it looked at it exited the press so it is not actually original unless bright and shinny.

Same with classic cars, the love of original/rat rod like cars is a mostly recent thing. If you had a barn find twenty years ago most of the car community would be asking when are you going to restore that, not please don't wash off the sixty years of bird droppings like many are today.

Personally I'm more a restoration guy, while I can appreciate some patina I prefer things to look like when it was made as opposed to something that you need a tetanus shot from looking at it.

Different strokes makes the world work and is perfectly fine, this would be a very boring world if everyone had to have and like things 100% the same.

Mr_Spud

What a coincidence, I was just looking up how to clean dug bottles because I’m considering purchasing this bottle off of eBay because it’s from Pennex pharmaceutical company which was the company that I worked for as my first real job after I graduated from college in the 1980s

The seller says it’s a dug bottle that needs a better cleaning. If I purchase it, I’d want to clean it back to its original appearance but in a way where I wouldn’t scratch it or make it noticable that it was cleaned. Like, if a coin had debris on it and you soaked it in mineral oil to remove the debris, it’s different than rubbing the coin with baking soda or dipping it in acidic coin cleaner. But yeah, if the bottle had a cool pearlescent patina you would want to leave it alone just like you wouldn’t want to remove nice toning off of a coin. That’s my take on it based on what I was thinking earlier today when I googled how to clean old bottles and found hits saying you can put salt in the bottle with a little water, not enough to dissolve the salt, and shake it and the salt acts as an abrasive to clean debris off the inside of the bottle without scratching it.

But I’d never clean these bottles that are on my bookshelf in my office at work. They are much more valuable because they still contain the original contents and/or the residue of their original contents for the ones that contained liquids

Nysoto

Restoration? No - coins, vintage guitars, antique furniture. I like the look of your bottles. I have some old watches with crusty original dials that I like:

A 1911 Martin shipped to Eilers Music in Seattle, December 1911. I am the second owner (edit, was in the Pike family until 2014):

Floridafacelifter

This was a gift I received from the SS Republic- still has some sea floor crud on it

LanceNewmanOCC

@Weiss said:

it is certainly a matter of preference but i'm in the camp if it is old, it should look old. (some exceptions apply to items well-stored)

i'd for sure want the majority of dirt/poop or whatever off but i like the grunginess otherwise so long as it isn't detrimental to the item like pvc is to coins.

neat pedley-ryan dollar and look.

pursuitofliberty

@Weiss said:

Are we dragging other hobbies, kicking and screaming, to recognize the authenticity of unaltered originals, or do you think we'll swing back around to join the others with shiny, polished coins eventually?

I hope we NEVER return to the place where dipped, processed and/or polished are the ideal conditions for our treasures. The amount lost through trying to "improve" them is already heart wrenching.

I personally would love and value your Pike's Peak flask far greater than one that had been polished and processed.

But then, my sig' line probably suggests that anyway ...

fathom

No I do not think the pendulum will swing back to cleaning coins other then restorative processes.

Knowledge is ubiquitous now with easy online research that originality is always best in numismatics.

bronzemat

Comic books go through restoration also. They can repair missing pieces of covers, they can take the wrinkles and rolls a comic book make have and "press" them. Pressing isn't too expensive, but i've never had it done.

When comics get graded, usually there will be a designation of a restoration, or the label used is a different color, I don't remember since I don't mess with graded comics.

All hobbies have restorations in some form, it's just up to us collectors if we want it in our collections or not.

Zoins

Dipping is super common in our hobby.

A big difference is that in other hobbies people are open about talking about restoration with respect to the history of specific specimens.

In coins, people prefer not to know about it or trace it.

Image a provenance chain for a coin that includes dates when a coin was dipped?

justindan

Restored it enough for cultivation. Not sure I'll ever restore the 'pretty' non functional parts.

D808LF

Wood restoration

First woodie restoration circa 1996: 1946 Ford Super Deluxe Station Wagon

Second woodie (minor resto) 2020: 1948 Mercury Station Wagon (green).

Sapyx

Two issues to point out here.

First, I think there must necessarily be a difference in mentality between those who collect "functional" items, like cars, watches and cameras, and "decorative" items like coins, glass bottles and toys. You watch any of those American Pickers / Antiques Roadshow type shows, and the first thing they ask when someone brings along a "functional" antique, is, "Does it work?". For functional antiques, actually working trumps originality in terms of value and collector desirability. Obviously, the optimal condition is 100% still original and 100% still functional. But very few things manage to be both, and still qualify as some kind of antique or collectable. Compromise is necessary.

Second, I think we do have to consider the substance of the thing being collected. What's it made of? And is that substance, by nature, enduring or ephemeral? "Restoration" is much more tolerable for collectables that are made of things like cloth, paper and plastic, as opposed to metal, glass and ceramic. Coin collectors frown upon cleaned coins, because coins frankly shouldn't need the help.

Both of these points seem to indicate that bottle collectors "should" be less tolerant of cleaning and restoration than they actually are. After all, bottles are not "functional", and glass is pretty enduring. Certainly the people who collect ancient and mediaeval glass artifacts tend to prefer authentic patina to "restoration to transparency".

Weiss

@Floridafacelifter said:
This was a gift I received from the SS Republic- still has some sea floor crud on it

That is so cool. I LOVE it!

conrad99

@D808LF said:
Wood restoration

First woodie restoration circa 1996: 1946 Ford Super Deluxe Station Wagon

Second woodie (minor resto) 2020: 1948 Mercury Station Wagon (green).

Wow, stellar! And a couple of retirement funds to boot.

FWIW, I collect old medicine bottles etc and the more authentic the better. I won't even look at anything that looks new or restored.

Far fewer people dip coins now compared to a generation or two ago. The word's out.

lordmarcovan

@Floridafacelifter said:
This was a gift I received from the SS Republic- still has some sea floor crud on it

Without that seafloor crud, that jar would lose all of its historical aura and character!

clarkbar04

My grandma had quite a collection of old bottles so I can appreciate those.
I love (ok it’s love/hate) restoring cars.
This is a 62 Pontiac I’m restoring in my garage. I’ve done all the work myself. It has a modern fuel injected engine in it out of a Chevy Tahoe.

winesteven

I’m surprised no one mentioned fine art! As @Sapyx mentions functionality above, like coins, fine art is not functional. Yet unlike coins, heavy restoration not only is accepted, but desired. What do I mean by heavy restoration? Go into any of the top museums and look at paintings several hundred years old. You’ll see many with BRIGHT colors, that have had experts apply bright paint all over them to make them look just like they did hundreds of years ago, like the day they left the artists studios!

Steve

Sapyx

With art like paintings, we go back to the material the collectable is made of. Paintings are an excellent example of that peculiar trait of humans: the tendency to try to construct something that is intended to last for multiple human generations, but using materials that are barely capable of lasting a single generation. If you went back in time to those classic painters from hundreds of years ago and ask them if their paintings should be "restored" by future generations, most would be astonished that their paintings are actually still around, and they would be equally astonished at how ephemeral some of the materials they used actually were, and how bad their un-restored paintings look after several hundred years of hanging in candlelit rooms. I do not think they would be sad or disappointed that skilled people who care about their paintings attempt to prevent decay and bring their painting back to as near as possible to the artist's original intent.

Even in art, the subject of restoration is controversial in terms of when and how it should be done. Even the people who are valiantly restoring an old masterpiece today will likely be cursing the bones of previous generations of restorers, who were so short-sighted as to use substance X or material Y in doing their restoration, because they did more long term harm than good. And I'm sure the people doing art restoration in several hundred years time will be cursing our bones for our current generation's short-sighted restoration efforts too.

Coins? As I said earlier, coins are made of much hardier stuff. Silver and gold coins, in particular, need no such special care.

Bronze and base-metal coins do normally need such care, if they're more than a few hundred years old. Ancient bronze coins, when freshly dug up out of the ground, normally look like little green rocks, and the boundary between "coin surface" and "layer of encrusted dirt" is blurry and diffuse. To turn it into something resembling a coin again, you need a skilled artist, not entirely unlike the skilled artists who extract fossils from rocks.

So there are exceptions to the "coins should not be restored" rule. But you won't find too many of those exceptions in the American coin series, because America simply hasn't been around for long enough for it to matter much.

winesteven

Well said, and while I don't really disagree with any of your points, I think you overlooked my main point. The goal of art restoration is to make it look like it originally did. Those who very gently dip coins to remove toning (tarnish as @ricko says), DUE TO THE MATERIALS (silver) are doing that very same thing - making it look like it originally did.

Just as in the past there were art restorers who either did not know what they were doing, or were handicapped by not having information which we now have, in the past there was a lot of overdipping by the numismatic community, and even today, there are people who don't know what they are doing as they overdip coins. There's an acceptable way to do it, and there's a wrong way.

Steve

Maywood

Coins and all the other collectible items listed have in common that collectors like them to be in the best condition possible without doing anything to alter their appearance. That is sometimes unavoidable. I have seen guitars which were repaired: they sounded acoustically fine but had damage from being dropped. I guess lots of people think that damage adds "charm" to their appearance. Glass is very durable, I find lots of bottles and wash off whatever dirt and grime I can. I guess lots of people think seeing the dirt "proves" they were in the ground and adds charm to their appearance. I've owned more cars and trucks than I care to remember. It wasn't fun watching them rust away and I sure didn't think they were very charming!!

Everyone involved in this thread so far who has rinsed ANY coin in acetone, submitted something for help with a TPG or bought something that they told themselves hadn't been dipped, though they knew better, is automatically disqualified.

Weiss

There is a lot of touch-up and restoration of fine art. But a ton of the bright colors is just removing 200 year old varnish that becomes unstable and stained with tobacco smoke.

Another Youtuber, Barmgartner Restoration, makes really high quality videos demonstrating the art and science of painting restoration.

winesteven

@Weiss said:
There is a lot of touch-up and restoration of fine art. But a ton of the bright colors is just removing 200 year old varnish that becomes unstable and stained with tobacco smoke.

Another Youtuber, Barmgartner Restoration, makes really high quality videos demonstrating the art and science of painting restoration.

While removing varnish as part of art restoration is a big part of what is often done, in many cases paint is indeed added.

Steve

jmlanzaf

A dirty bottle is NOT ORIGINAL. It's dirty. If an eyelash landed on your coin, would you blow it off or slab it quickly to preserve the originality of the eyelash?

jmlanzaf

@winesteven said:

@Weiss said:
There is a lot of touch-up and restoration of fine art. But a ton of the bright colors is just removing 200 year old varnish that becomes unstable and stained with tobacco smoke.

Another Youtuber, Barmgartner Restoration, makes really high quality videos demonstrating the art and science of painting restoration.

While removing varnish as part of art restoration is a big part of what is often done, in many cases paint is indeed added.

Steve

Yes. There were multiple layers removed from the Sistine Chapel ceiling.

The old pigments were prone to oxidation which changes their color. There is an interesting correlation here between color shifts in paintings and toning on coins.

jmlanzaf

@winesteven said:
Well said, and while I don't really disagree with any of your points, I think you overlooked my main point. The goal of art restoration is to make it look like it originally did. Those who very gently dip coins to remove toning (tarnish as @ricko says), DUE TO THE MATERIALS (silver) are doing that very same thing - making it look like it originally did.

Just as in the past there were art restorers who either did not know what they were doing, or were handicapped by not having information which we now have, in the past there was a lot of overdipping by the numismatic community, and even today, there are people who don't know what they are doing as they overdip coins. There's an acceptable way to do it, and there's a wrong way.

Steve

I believe we had a 300 post argument over the meaning of "original" earlier this year. In numismatics, "original" doesn't really mean original.

Coin "restoration" or "curating" is akin to benign "doctoring". Coin folk are not purists on the issue. Virtually everyone on this forum will dip something in acetone to remove oils and organic material which is just as "original" as toning. In fact, some oils are present from the minting process and might be actually original to the coin. PCGS and NGC have "conservation" services which is really just professional cleaning which can include lightening of toning.

Would you rather have a coin that is attractive and stable or a coin that is unattractive and unstable but "original"???

Album toning is "natural" and "original" but if that album is made of PVC, the "album toning" is considered "unnatural" and immediately removed.

calgolddiver

My 64 ... restored (obviously) lots of originality still there yet also lots of replacement parts for body panels, interior replacements, suspension, motor rebuild, etc. The car collection crowd loves originality, original engine block stamps and original trim tags. They accept the "new patina" of a repaint to preferably the original color. Those vintage examples trade at a premium. The NOM (not original motor) market is also strong yet much less pricey.

winesteven

Gorgeous car! Glad to hear "They accept the new patina of a repaint to preferably the original color".

Steve

calgolddiver

@winesteven said:
Gorgeous car! Glad to hear "They accept the new patina of a repaint to preferably the original color".

Steve

Thanks Steve !!

Weiss

@jmlanzaf said:
A dirty bottle is NOT ORIGINAL. It's dirty. If an eyelash landed on your coin, would you blow it off or slab it quickly to preserve the originality of the eyelash?

Which is more authentic: A bottle buried in a privy for 120 years with a layer of patina on it, or a bottle buried in a privy for 120 years with its surface mechanically and chemically stripped off?

The same question could be said about coins.

ricko

Such a discussion can be very interesting and informative. However, the resolution lies only with the individual collectors (buyers/sellers). Enjoy the coins you collect and collect what you like. Cheers, RickO