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Woodwork handcrafts tell WNC tobacco history 

Business: New Leaf Historical Woodwork, furniture and other housewares made from the wood of Appalachian tobacco barns.

Who: Terri King, owner; Roger Shelton, master craftsman.

Headquarters: Asheville.

Offerings: Everything from picture frames and small wooden trays to tables, chests and custom furniture. Each item comes with a written history of the barn where the wood originated.

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Audrey Hepburn stamp to go on sale in Berlin  

BERLIN -- A collector stands to make a tidy profit after discovering a rare stamp portraying movie star Audrey Hepburn smoking -- one of a series that should have been incinerated by the German government.

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Audrey Hepburn Stamp Fetches Euro67, 000 in Germany  

A rare stamp portraying movie star Audrey Hepburn smoking sold for euro67,000 ($93,800) at an auction in Germany on Tuesday.

The Schlegel auction house declined to identify the buyer, who was represented by an agent.

A minimum bid of euro30,000 was set for the stamp, of which only five copies are known to exist. . . .

The print run was destroyed after Hepburn's son, Sean Ferrer, objected to the cigarette holder dangling from the actress' mouth and refused to grant copyright.

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Rare Audrey Hepburn stamp goes to auction 

A collector stands to make a tidy profit after discovering a rare stamp portraying movie star Audrey Hepburn smoking — one of a series that should have been incinerated by the German government.

In 2001, the government printed 14 million Audrey Hepburn stamps as part of a series featuring movie stars including Charlie Chaplin, Marilyn Monroe and Greta Garbo. The print run was destroyed after Hepburn's son, Sean Ferrer, objected to the cigarette holder dangling from the actress' mouth and refused to grant copyright. . . .

Ferrer said he hoped the collector would use proceeds from the auction to support cancer research or anti-smoking campaigns. His movie star mother died of colon cancer in 1993.

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Something old: Smoking out of style, but not collectibles  

Smoking was an important part of the life of a well-to-do gentleman in the 19th century. A cigar after dinner was routine. Smoking paraphernalia was created not only to be useful but also to show off wealth.

Collectors today still search for all kinds of tobacco-related items, although smoking has lost favor. Pipes, ashtrays, cigar holders, lighters, cigarette or cigar cases, cigarette or cigar boxes, cigarette dispensers and smoking stands are collected.

Many items sell for under $50, but some "tobacciana" collectibles are very expensive. Chrome, plastic, glass or porcelain match and cigarette urns, jewel-studded gold or silver cigarette cases, sterling cigarette boxes for the table and bronze ashtrays by famous makers sell to collectors of fine arts.

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Smoking paraphernalia often a sign of wealth  

Smoking was an important part of the life of a well-to-do gentleman in the 19th century. A cigar after dinner was routine. Smoking paraphernalia was created not only to be useful but also to show off wealth.

Collectors today still search for all kinds of tobacco-related items, although smoking has lost favor. Pipes, ashtrays, cigar holders, lighters, cigarette or cigar cases, cigarette or cigar boxes, cigarette dispensers and smoking stands are collected. Some collectors want commercial packaging and advertising, including cigar box labels and wooden boxes, packs of matches, cigar bands, cigarettes packs, trade cards for tobacco products, cut-out newspaper and magazine ads, large posters and other store ads, and store cigar lighters and cabinets. Many items sell for under $50, but some "tobacciana" collectibles are very expensive.

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• Show is a look back at heyday of local tobacco 

An old tobacco carton can be a valuable thing.

Wayne Biby of Winston-Salem was trying to sell one for $500 at yesterday's Piedmont Tobacco Memorabilia and Postcard Show and Sale in the Home and Garden building at the Dixie Classic Fairgrounds.

The carton once contained a cigarette brand called Reyno, one of the first cigarettes made by R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., Biby's former employer.

Thousands of other items could be purchased at the annual show. It was sponsored by the Piedmont Tobacco Memorabilia Collectors Club, which meets in High Point. About 400 people attended the show, organizers said. The items included a Camel mirror, a Wake Forest University lighter, an old postcard featuring the Reynolds Building at night, receipts, rolling papers, pocket tins, plug cutters, and tobacco grinders, tags and pouches.

"It's a connection to their past," Biby, a dealer, said about why people collect tobacco memorabilia. "It brings back stories that they heard their parents and grandparents talking about."

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Know Your Antiques: 'Tobacciana' Are Smoking-Hot Collectibles 

Smoking was an important part of the life of a well-to-do gentleman in the 19th century. A cigar after dinner was routine. Smoking paraphernalia was created not only to be useful but also to show off wealth.

Collectors today still search for all kinds of tobacco-related items, although smoking has lost favor. Pipes, ashtrays, cigar holders, lighters, cigarette or cigar cases, cigarette or cigar boxes, cigarette dispensers and smoking stands are collected.

Some collectors want commercial packaging and advertising, including cigar box labels and wooden boxes, packs of matches, cigar bands, cigarettes packs, trade cards for tobacco products, cut-out newspaper and magazine ads, large posters and other store ads, and store cigar lighters and cabinets.

Many items sell for under $50, but some "tobacciana" collectibles are very expensive.

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Smoking rarities go under the hammer 

Now a rare collection of smoking paraphernalia is going under the hammer in Lancashire and drawing interest from smokers around the globe.

Lots include a 17th century early Bristol Monkey clay pipe, Oriental opium pipes and a colourful glass smoking pipe.

Scores of smoking enthusiasts from America, Austria, Holland and Germany have registered their interest. The auction is on Thursday, at Silverwoods of Lancashire, at the Ribblesdale Centre in Clitheroe.

Principle antiques auctioneer Wilf Mould said: "There are people who do collect these things for their individuality. We have had stacks of inquiries from America where they have smoking clubs.

"We are expecting interest on the phone where we have to give a description. There has also been interest from Austria, Holland and Germany."

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• `Global' cigarette brands with local flavor 

Hundreds of cigarette packs covered the surface of a 1-meter by half-meter display table, attracting visitors at a recent exhibition for hobbyists in Kemang, South Jakarta.

Visitors taking a closer look at the table raised their eyebrows after realizing there was something peculiar about some of cigarette packs.

"I thought it was a pack of Marlboros, but no, the brand reads *Malioboro'," a young woman giggled.

Malioboro, the name of a famous shopping arcade in Yogyakarta, had been stylized to mimic the world-famous Marlboro logo.

Other visitors who noticed the parody broke into laughter, after realizing there were other "misspelled" brands on other cigarette packs they had thought they were familiar with.

"Many visitors were tricked with the physical appearance of some of the cigarette packs in our collection," Andreas, one of the exhibitors, told The Jakarta Post. . . .

Among the tricky brands were Blank, imitating Djarum's Black cigarettes, Start Milik (a play on Bentoel's Star Mild), and Gudang Ganda (mimicking Gudang Garam).

These "imitation" cigarette packs were among the thousands collected by members of the Indonesian Cigarette Collectors' Community.

Established in August last year, the community brings together collectors from all over the country to share information about cigarettes, and allows members to offer, sell or barter their collections through the Internet and meetings.

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Every cigarette pack I ever collected has a story behind it.
Emirza Irsan, the Indonesian Cigarette Collectors' Community chairman, in a remarkable story on the community's large collection of trademark-infringing "imitation" packs.

Front Row - Some Fashion Week Events Open to the Public  

some designers are planning events for the week that are open to the public and, in some cases, possibly more interesting than anything happening on a catwalk.

Theodoric Bland Willoughby, who goes by Teddy and calls his collection Bland (it's both his middle name and kind of funny), is organizing a weeklong installation at the Asia Song Society, where a band of merry fashion makers will display and sell small objects. Mr. Willoughby is bringing a fresh batch of his provocatively wicked cigarette pins ($30 and up), which look like cigarettes burned halfway down with the ash intact.

The pop-up store, at 45 Canal Street, from Feb. 14 to 20

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Cigarette keepsakes ignite man's passion 

Taylor, 71, started collecting all things connected to Camel, one of Reynolds' best-known cigarette brands, after he retired 20 years ago. He worked as a department supervisor in production at R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. for 23 years, and he bought some pieces from the company's souvenir store.

He also combed flea markets from Ohio to Florida, he said. After a while, no one had to worry about what to give him for his birthday or Christmas. Anything related to Camel would do.

Last year, his wife, Bobbie Taylor, bought him a hand-carved wooden camel made in Jerusalem. . . .

Bobbie Taylor smoked Camels now and then in her smoking days, but she and her husband gave up cigarettes in 1987, when doctors told her that she had early-stage lung cancer. Despite being a nonsmoker for more than 20 years, Jesse Taylor still retains fond memories of his years in the tobacco industry.

Watching his former company shrink and splinter has been hard for him.

"I'll tell you one thing - it was a great company to work for," he said. "In the old days, you were people, not a number."

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Indonesian Collector Oei Turns Tobacco Into Art, Sees Slowdown  

Indonesian art collector Oei Hong Djien is planning his third museum. There isn't room in his existing two galleries and house for more than a fraction of the 1,500 works he acquired over the past three decades.

Oei, 69, was one of the first to systematically buy contemporary Indonesian art, long before prices for the nation's artists began to rise exponentially in 2006. . . .

Oei studied pathological anatomy in the Netherlands before returning to Magelang in 1968 after the death of his father to take over the family tobacco business. On the wall next to the entrance of his modern-art museum is a two-story marble relief by Widayat depicting the cycle of the tobacco plant, from seedlings through to the bales of dried leaves in a warehouse and, below, an art gallery.

Tobacco Warehouse

``We are turning tobacco into art,'' grinned Oei, looking at the mural. It's a tobacco warehouse that Oei plans to convert into the new museum. Work will probably start after the current harvest, he said.

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Drawcard for puff daddies 

In 1900 smoking was seen as a predominantly upper-class pursuit. Edward, Prince of Wales, was among the first public figures to champion the fad - after dinner, of course, in the drawing room.

By this time most tobacco - including more than 85 per cent in England - was sold in tins for pipe smoking. Gentlemen of distinction could order a personal blend to be kept in one's humidor at home.

It wasn't until World War I that packaged cigarettes began to outsell pipe tobacco. . . .

This brief history, courtesy of the Benson and Hedges One Hundred Years booklet, seems almost fanciful today. Yet, against increasing public pressure, there are still those who enjoy a pipe even if they can no longer do it in public.

Prolific puffers have included Albert Einstein . . .

Pipe collectors and smokers can join clubs or online forums such as the Australian Pipe Smoking Forum.

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Arkansas man buys Wagner baseball card for $1.62M  

A 1909 Honus Wagner baseball card was sold for $1.62 million at a memorabilia auction in Chicago, a sports auction company said Saturday.

The record price for a baseball card is $2.8 million - paid in 2007 for a near-mint condition Wagner card released in 1909 by the American Tobacco Company.

John Rogers, 35, of North Little Rock, Ark., said his winning bid for the T206 Wagner card is the realization of a decades-long dream.

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