I’m a magazine addict. At the age of 14, my aunt gave me a subscription to The World of Interiors. Forty-four years later, I now have an almost complete run of the magazine, kept in a bedroom cupboard, with serried ranks arranged by date and year. It would be hard to part with them.
As a writer specialising in antiques and social history, vintage magazines are an invaluable source of inspiration, Purnell’s colourful part-work from 1970, which I found on eBay for a bargain £25. Running to some 80 issues, it’s beautifully illustrated and packed with fascinating articles written by the leading antiques experts of the day. And I’m currently amassing a set of vintage from the 1960s and 1970s, which also come up for sale regularly on eBay for under £10 each. They’re an intriguing snapshot of the past, and a helpful source for dealers and collectors in post-war decorative arts: Italian desk lighting, Dansk Købenstyle cookware, Iittala glass, and the Crayonne range of plastics, as sold by Terence Conran’s Habitat.
