00:00Hello, yes, I am here in a damp and dingy looking London today.
00:05It's starting to feel like autumn is on the horizon and as we move into September,
00:12we are looking at a new trend, second-hand September.
00:16So often, whether it's home items or fashion, people all around the country and in London
00:22are buying mass-produced goods.
00:25But how can we buy more things that are second-hand?
00:30Well, luckily, in London, there is an abundance of charity shops to head into.
00:35But when it comes to buying second-hand stuff,
00:38is there anything more fun than heading to an antique shop?
00:43So in the shop, we've got 18 different dealers and they each buy their own stock independently,
00:48source it from wherever they get it, through the trade, from house clearances, from auctions, etc.
00:52Some people favour, we've got a specialist in sort of 1950s Danish type stuff.
01:01We've got people who favour Victorian furniture.
01:03So there's no hard and fast rules as to what we sell, but we try to avoid things that are too modern.
01:08So we get everything from Georgian, Victorian stuff,
01:14through to, I suppose, the ever-popular mid-century furniture, we cover all that.
01:19If you buy a piece of antique furniture, if it's been around for one, two hundred years,
01:22and you know it's going to continue to exist, it's not going to fall apart,
01:26whereas some modern stuff, which is more cheaply made, will sort of deteriorate very quickly.
01:30So that's why some of this furniture, a lot of it, has a sort of almost investment value.
01:34Occasionally in the shop, we get really, really good pieces, really, really rare pieces.
01:37And the trade people look at it, you know, it'll go flying out or create a lot of interest.
01:43But generally, I like all of it. I just love it all.
01:47I love everything about this shop. I love all the stuff we sell.
01:49Now sometimes when I think of antiques, my mind runs to old watches or expensive dinner sets.
01:56From World War II or sometime in history.
01:58But the truth is, there are plenty of things to buy on a budget as well.
02:03So I want to know what I could get my hands on for just £50.
02:07So if you're on a budget, if you've got, you know, we sell things from about £25 upwards,
02:12ranging up to a few thousand sort of thing.
02:15So if you've got a small budget, you can always get a little something decorative,
02:18a small item, a bit of ceramic, a mirror, something like that.
02:21There's always odd bits here. There's always quirky things,
02:23you know, a little piece of carving or a tiny sculpture or what have you.
02:26There's lots of, there's always something interesting to find here.
02:29And it changes very often. So it's, you never know what you're going to find.
02:33I used to be a telecoms engineer.
02:35And my last job was in the Isle of Dogs, working for a big American company.
02:37And they, I got made redundant and somehow fell into, into picture hanging.
02:45So when I'm not doing this, I do, I hang fine off people.
02:47I know.
02:48And it sort of goes hand in hand with antiques.
02:50Yeah.
02:50And got involved with this.
02:52I think I just came into the shop one day and bought something.
02:54I thought, that's pretty cool.
02:55I like this shop.
02:56And never went back into telecoms and carried on doing this.
02:59I like this shop.
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