Opening days: Friday and Saturday from 10:00 to 18:00 or by appointement. tel: 04-9841648

Village Antiques - the Difference between Old and New!

- The Country Store in Ein Hod, with an atmosphere found only in North American Antique shops –

Village Antiques was born in 1998, when after 20 years, Claude decided to take an early pension from the Technion and devote his time to an old hobby, collecting and restoring old furniture and objects of interest.

The first two containers came from Eastern Canada, mostly from French Quebec. Simple and almost primitive wooden furniture, with clean lines, in solid Canadian woods like, oak, maple and pine, painted or in the original wood patinas; historical tools, kitchen ware and bric-a-brac, which reminisce the every-day life in Canadian villages in the years 1850 – 1920. The original French Canadian settlers became more affluent and middle-class in the 1950’s and came to despise their old furniture and belongings. They wanted everything new and modern! In those years, much was burned in bonfires or thrown into the junk piles. Thankfully, there are always those who make it their business to pull things out of the garbage dumps and give them a new life. Since then, the Canadians have made a great effort to find and restore their old French Canadian Heritage, and today, this type of furniture is becoming more and more rare and desirable, even in old Quebec!

This was a first for an Israeli antique shop, most of whom were shipping huge containers of European style furniture from England and France, with doubtful heritage.

The 3rd container came from New Zealand, where we spent one of our sabbaticals. Purely by accident, we discovered that New Zealand is a stock-pile of early 1900 English furniture and 1920’s original Art Deco. We brought with us to Israel a huge collection of great oak chests, washstands, vitrines and desks with baccalite handles and ornaments; clocks, wooden cathedral tube radios and unbelievable original chrome and colored formica pieces. In this way we also became interested in the 1950’s and started our collection of Israeli items, from ceramics, to metals to advertising paraphernalia.