GUEST: It's been in my family for at least 65 years, I would say. My father was in the wrecking business--wrecked old homes all over Texas, some in Louisiana, some in Mississippi--and many times, things like this would be left in a house. People would walk away leaving wonderful pieces, or sometimes he would buy pieces from homeowners before the buildings were torn down. And I remember this very early on in my life being in our home, and then I've owned it since he passed on in the '60s.
APPRAISER: Well, what I want to do is take a look at the bottom, at the array of marks. We see a German mark.
GUEST: Right.
APPRAISER: We see this, which is conventionally known as a Royal Vienna beehive mark.
GUEST: Oh.
APPRAISER: Have you ever heard of the company Royal Vienna before?
GUEST: Yes.
APPRAISER: And then we have this interesting gold clover that appears to be covering something up, which is interesting. So, Royal Vienna was a very important factory that was established about 1717 and was in operation until 1864. And it made some of the best porcelain around. It was just an amazing group of folks, and great, great pieces. Now, the bad news is this isn't Royal Vienna.
GUEST: Well...
APPRAISER: This piece was made a good bit later. This piece was probably made in the early part of the 20th century, maybe as late at 1920, and could be a little further. But what happened with Royal Vienna was everybody wanted to emulate that, and there were probably 20 or 30 makers at least
that were making things in this style. So that gold clover is actually covering up the original maker of this particular vase.
GUEST: Oh.
APPRAISER: It was then decorated by another company, probably in Dresden or some other part of Germany, maybe even in Vienna itself, and they put on the faux beehive mark.
GUEST: Wow.
APPRAISER: And the mark originally, just to be clear, was actually a shield, okay? But it's conventionally referred to as a beehive mark. Now, the actual maker of the piece doesn't particularly matter in this case, so what we would refer to it is is a Royal Vienna-style massive monumental vase, okay? Now, any clue what you think it might be worth?
GUEST: No idea.
APPRAISER: Well, we've been talking about it, trying to figure out where we think we would go with it, and if it was placed in an auction today in 2012, I would suggest an estimate of between $3,000 and $5,000.
GUEST: Ooh!
APPRAISER: It would not surprise me if it did $6,000 to $8,000.
GUEST: Well, that's incredible!
