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RARE 1950s Levi's Type 2 Jacket Recently Sold on Ebay

majormajor

One Too Many
Messages
1,713
Location
UK
You're telling me.

The problem with these kind of sales is that you can never prove that it was a genuine sale (the winning bidder (the ONLY bidder!) is "private", so you can't check that they actually bought it), but it still has the effect of putting up the perceived value.

The same thing has happened on the guitar market. Instruments that Gibson couldn't give away in 1960 are now worth more than a decent house in the Home Counties.

Collectors and the modern connected world are a dangerous mixture:eeek:;)
 

Sloan1874

I'll Lock Up
Messages
8,418
Location
Glasgow
Thought the nine screen views looked on rather odd. Ebay has an odd effect in distorting prices, though. I spoke to a second hand vinyl dealer in Edinburgh yesterday and he said that the Japanese will shell out big bucks on hokey old country and western records, Jim Reeves etc, that the good folk of Morningside wouldn't give house room to. [huh]
 

majormajor

One Too Many
Messages
1,713
Location
UK
Thought the nine screen views looked on rather odd.

Dead right.

There were a few details that pointed to a not very old repro, rather than a vintage piece. But we'll never know, 'cause "someone" paid $3500 for it.

Give me a couple of grand, and I could make ANY denim jacket look vintage;)

Hint: The hardest bit to fake is the label....."What did you say Mr Ebayer? The label's missing? Well I never!!"
 
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Edward

Bartender
Messages
24,796
Location
London, UK
Weird, I thought I'd replied to this thread earlier? Maybe confused it with a similar one....

Thought the nine screen views looked on rather odd. Ebay has an odd effect in distorting prices, though. I spoke to a second hand vinyl dealer in Edinburgh yesterday and he said that the Japanese will shell out big bucks on hokey old country and western records, Jim Reeves etc, that the good folk of Morningside wouldn't give house room to. [huh]

It can cut both ways, too. There are some items on the Rocky Horror circuit that were always much harder to get hold of in the UK than in the US, and consequently were worth far more. When eBay and paypal came along and buying from the US became easy, the value of those items on the market here dropped significantly.

Course, the Japanese dealers buying that stuff now will turn around and sell it back for five times the price in years to come.... ;)
 

karhu21

One of the Regulars
Messages
144
Location
finland
Quite agree there MM.

Cannot be sure that anyone actually paid that price for a fifties denim jacket unless the seller could furnish providence that it once belonged to someone like
James Dean for example.

Vintage guitars have gone way over the top in price judging by some of these dealer´s websites and not just the Gibson Fender Martins but even names like
Watkins, Framus and Höfner once fairly affordable are now getting very expensive.
 

YETI

A-List Customer
Messages
439
Location
Bay Area, CA
Dead right.

There were a few details that pointed to a not very old repro, rather than a vintage piece. But we'll never know, 'cause "someone" paid $3500 for it.

Give me a couple of grand, and I could make ANY denim jacket look vintage;)

Hint: The hardest bit to fake is the label....."What did you say Mr Ebayer? The label's missing? Well I never!!"

Actually, I received a bit of insider info on the unusual transaction regarding the jacket. The seller had just picked the jacket at an estate/yard sale and had to do a quick flip listing the photos first and waiting to add a detailed description knowing the pics alone would pique the interest of serious collectors e.g., Japanese buyers. I'll just say the buyer's passion for vintage denim/workwear can be "Inspirational".
To address the missing label, there are remnants of leather attached to the stitching. It's so dried out it looks like beef jerky.
 

majormajor

One Too Many
Messages
1,713
Location
UK
Actually, I received a bit of insider info on the unusual transaction regarding the jacket. The seller had just picked the jacket at an estate/yard sale and had to do a quick flip listing the photos first and waiting to add a detailed description knowing the pics alone would pique the interest of serious collectors e.g., Japanese buyers. I'll just say the buyer's passion for vintage denim/workwear can be "Inspirational".
To address the missing label, there are remnants of leather attached to the stitching. It's so dried out it looks like beef jerky.

Unfortunately, that doesn't alter the fact that the "price paid" could well be spurious.

Any seller can arrange for a non-existent "private buyer" to put in a vastly inflated buy, in order to try and establish that the thing is worth more.

As someone else said, a jacket with no linked provenance to someone special is simply not worth that kind of figure.
 
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