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14-D Maine Antique Digest, May 2015
- FEATURE -
to be north of Hartford rush hour
traffic so that on weekends they
could get away to their second
home in Vermont and go skiing
at Mad River Glen.
But the historic restoration
boom was short-lived. Doig said,
“Through the eighties, the cred-
its that made that possible were
repealed.” Seeing the writing on
the wall, Doig gradually eased
into the antiques market. In 1986
he incorporated the antiques
business (CPAs are careful about
such things). And by 1992 he
was completely out of the real
estate business.
Doig relied on his restoration
skills. He said, “I would buy
distressed pieces—mostly high
country and formal—fix them up
and sell them at auction. I used
to do a lot of inlay repair. It was
a good market.” Until it wasn’t.
Doig said, “The auction market
collapsed when the real estate
market collapsed in Connecti-
cut.” That was in the late ’80s
and early ’90s.
Doig took space in some group
shops and did some shows. The
first group shop was one opened
by his neighbors Tom and Ann
Cochran across the street from
the Doigs’ home in Somers. He
also tried one of the York, Maine,
group shops but left after a short
time. “It was too country for us.
Then we moved up the road to
MacDougall-Gionet for a few
years,” Doig said. Shows “were
never a huge part of my business.
We moved here in 1982 with two
kids under two years old, and I
didn’t want to spend time away
on weekends.” (In addition to
their son in South Carolina, the
Doigs have a daughter, Eleanor,
who’s a nurse practitioner in
Boston.)
Nevertheless, over the last few
decades, Doig has done his share
of shows. At one time or another,
he has done most of the vari-
ous Brimfield venues, including
May’s field for ten years. He
has also exhibited at the Tolland
show for 15 years or so. He espe-
cially likes Nan Gurley’s shows
and has done her Wednesday
“Short and Sweet” show along
with her Sunday shows and the
Deerfield, New Hampshire,
show during Antiques Week in
August. He’s also happy with
shows he does in Wells and
Boothbay, Maine. “I like them a
lot,” he said.
When he does shows, he said,
he often splits a booth with Ian
McKelvey. “As pickers, neither
of us always has enough to do a
full booth,” he explained.
In fact, being a picker—selling
to other dealers—has been the
mainstay of his business since
at least the mid-1990s. How
one meets those dealers can be
a serendipitous affair. Take, for
example, how Doig met South
Carolina dealer Michael Rainey,
who has been a regular customer
now for a dozen years (in addi-
tion to being a major influence
in drawing Doig’s son to the
South). Doig recalled for us that
he was in the nearby Willington
Antiques group shop, where he
had space for years.
“It was the end of the day,
and I was sitting around having
a beer with the proprietor, Steve
Kochenburger. I was telling him
I had just gotten a good box with
the initials ‘MR’ and he said,
‘Now you just need somebody
whose initials are MR.’Then this
guy walks over and said, ‘That
would be me.’” It was Rainey,
whose initials are of course
“MR.” “Steve was a longtime
friend of Mike Rainey. That’s
why he was there,” Doig said.
Since that day, Doig has been
selling steadily to Rainey. “We’ll
talk on the phone, and I’ll buy
stuff for him. Three or four times
a year he comes up here.”
Although he still buys pri-
marily high country and formal
furniture, Doig said the shifting
antiques market has forced him
to expand his horizons. “I’m
becoming a little more diverse
and buying outside my com-
fort zone. I’m buying things
I wouldn’t have bought eight
years ago.” But he’s still buy-
ing—and selling.
For information contact Sandy
Doig, Somers, CT, (860) 763-
0597, cell (860) 550-0227;
>.
By appointment.
This miniature mahogany chest with period pulls and poplar
secondary wood is just over 12" wide and priced at $450.
The Windsor sack-back armchair in old refin-
ish is $450. “It’s quintessential Connecticut,”
Doig said.
Card table with oval and string inlay, $600.
The papier-mâché tray with gilt decoration on a
swing-support trestle base is stamped “B. Walton &
Co. / Warranted,” which, Doig said, dates it to between
1842 and 1847. It’s also the type of piece, he said, that
in former times would have been outside his comfort
zone. It also bears a partial seller’s label—W. Willett,
Sloane Square, London—from what appears to be a
somewhat later date. It’s priced at $550.
A partial view of Doig’s storage unit where he keeps some of his
inventory. If this were a color photo, Sandy’s fondness for brown
furniture would be apparent.
Bottom view of a bee-
hive-turned maple bowl. “It
came from a house twenty
miles from here, and I think it
may have started there,” Doig
said. It’s $280.
Pair of NewYork andirons and a period fender. The fender is priced
at $650. Of the andirons, Doig said, “We’ll sell them with pleasure
for $250. That’s how much andirons have come down. They died
completely. They crashed but are coming back.” Nevertheless, he
added, the demand for fenders, screens, and fire tools is coming
back stronger than it is for andirons. He said his dealers in the
Washington, D.C., area tend to be his most active buyers of this
material.
This mahogany candlestand has
banded, accelerated taper feet
and a striated ball standard, sug-
gesting that it was made some-
where north of Boston. It has an
oak turning block and is priced
at $650.
Three marked 18th-century Pennsyl-
vania sickles with delicate serrated
blades. Doig said, “One is marked
with a crown so it may be pre-Revo-
lutionary.” He’s asking $200 for the
three together.