Posted by Bob Alimi on March 11, 1999 at 19:17:31:
In Reply to: Re: Would you buy a rug on the Internet? posted by Pat Weiler on March 08, 1999 at 08:31:02:
:I try to get out and look for rugs whenever I am out of town. I find very few rug stores, even in large town, such as Milwaukee or Sacramento
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: Pat Weiler
Well, Sacramento *does* have rug shops. There are 3 within 2 miles of my house, and probably a total of 6 or 7 in the metro area. The problem is that not a *single* shop has any interest is stocking rugs of a collectable nature. It is a purely decorative market in this town! So I try and take advantage of occasional trips to the Bay area.
I'm a novice collector. I have 5 pieces I really like, and own at least as many mistakes. I've found the 'net to be a valuable supplement to my growing collection of rug books. I spend a fair amount of time lurking at TurkoTek and am fairly addicted to watching rug offerings on eBay. I've purchased a few eBay rugs. I tend to think it's fairly unusual that real bargains can be had on eBay. A great many sellers either don't have the ability (or possibly in a few cases, the desire) to accurately describe a rug's condition. There are some good sellers though. Obviously, the trust issue takes on great significance when you're buying a rug based on one or two jpg images and a paragraph of descriptive text. But I suppose people phone in bids to Sotheby's based on what they see in an auction catalog. If you trust the source...
As to how folks get addicted to rugs, perhaps that might be a topic of a future Turkotek salon. Not so much a salon for debate and discussion, but simply one where the Turkotek regulars can describe just how they got caught up in the world of weavings. I think it'd make interesting reading!
-Bob