Interior Design Guide Trends

Antique Love in a Modern World

Country French Interiors

Trends, they come and go, but furnishing homes with priceless and meaningful antiques will remain a culturally affluent affection both here in Dallas and abroad. However, scouting the world for well preserved fine furnishings from centuries past has turned into a modern sport, explains Bruno de la Croix-Vaubois of Country French Interiors, thanks to the World Wide Web.

Internet antique sales have skyrocketed, “because it’s popular, convenient, and an available tool that people like to use,” says Croix-Vaubois. “Dallas is an antique center— Slocum Street, Dragon Street, Hi Line Drive for example—which is great for our city,’ he says, ‘but when people don’t have the time to physically go to the different showrooms, they can easily access different websites to search for what they are looking for.” Making the investment of an expensive antique piece online though, can have its risks. Buyers lose the one-on-one connection with the piece and the ability to thoroughly examine the details, but most serious buyers, Croix-Vaubois says, are loyal clients who trust the integrity of the company they are selecting from and the quality of their inventory. An interesting turn of events, Croix-Vaubois recalls, is the surging antique market here in the Unites States, which is thriving with more opportunities than some of the highly acclaimed antique meccas across the pond. “It’s worth exploring’, he says, referring to the U.S. market, ‘especially in California, where great English, French and Italian pieces can be found right now.” Because of the fluctuating value of the Euro, pieces overseas can ring up a price tag of over three times what they may cost here, so finding local deals has become extremely important in the antique marketplace. While all of Croix-Vaubois dealings are traditional in look, feel, color and style, he’s noticed a recent surge in the popularity of a few specific niche designs. “More and more people are creating Spanish castle and chateau style homes, with heavy stone and carved furniture,” he explains, which creates a need and desire for Gothic and Renaissance-fashioned accents and design elements. Another style antique buyers have recently been gravitating towards is fine, hand painted furniture from Southern France and Italy, because of the intricate, personalized, and quality craftsmanship of the pieces, which can add exquisite character to a room. Dealers, designers, and antique-lovers alike have taken the long-kept, traditional pursuit of the Old World design aesthetic and combined it with the immediate gratification of today’s modern internet era. But regardless of technological advancements, the art of collecting fine antiques will always be rooted in a traditional, perpetual style.

Interview with: Bruno de la Croix-Vaubois
Country French Interiors

Interviewed by Rayven Williams, copy writer
 

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Related terms: Accessories, Antiques, Furniture

by: Rayven