Sourcing — Our selection process | LAPIERRE MARKET

Source, verify, restore, photograph

This page describes how every piece in the catalogue arrives on your screen. The process is deliberately long and disciplined. It is the bulk of the gallery's work, and it explains why the catalogue grows steadily rather than in bursts.

Five steps structure the work: sourcing, verification, transport, measured restoration, photography. A sixth step — cataloguing with a Draft listing then an Active publication — closes the cycle. No step is skipped, even for a simple piece.

Where we source

Sourcing happens in France and in five neighbouring countries, through six main channels.

Specialist antique markets. The Saint-Ouen flea market in Paris, regional professional markets, twentieth-century specialist fairs. Regular physical presence, identified contacts, on-site negotiation. Good finds leave fast: presence and a clear search brief are required.

Auctions. Regional and Paris auction houses, specialist twentieth-century design sales, estate sales. Active monitoring of online catalogues, prior study of lots, physical inspection when ambiguous. A properly filtered auction remains one of the best channels for rare pieces.

European specialist dealers. Italy for Cassina, Arflex, B&B Italia, Tecno; the Netherlands and Belgium for modular furniture and Eames-Vitra editions; Germany for Thonet, Knoll Europe and original Werkstätten editions; the United Kingdom for Race, Robin Day and British editions. The address book is built over time, through regular exchange with around twenty trusted dealers.

Private sellers via the buyback program. The most qualitatively interesting channel, because the pieces have lived with a single household. Proposals come through our sell page. Each case is studied, photographs requested, and pieces taken either at a firm buy price or on consignment.

Private sales and destocking. End-of-cycle dealer and editor inventory drops, retiring architects' stock, redistributions of informed amateur collections. These channels are not public; they open through recommendation, after several cycles of correctly handled transactions.

Documented estates. Pieces from documented 1960-1990 interiors, often sold as a lot by heirs or by a notary acting as agent. Provenance is traceable, condition is generally good because the pieces have been used in a single home, and the narrative is easy to document. Estates are also the main source for our vintage tableware — Gien, Sarreguemines services, Vallauris ceramics, Iittala glassware — sourced as constituted lots from successive generations.

The address book

Beyond public channels, a meaningful share of sourcing rests on a confidential address book: regional dealers who call when they pull a piece, restorers who flag a passage in the workshop, collectors rebalancing their collection. This book is not built in six months; it is built through accumulated correct transactions, fair pricing and prompt settlement. That is precisely what separates serious sourcing from opportunistic capture.

The book is not fixed. We regularly work with new dealers, starting with low-commitment pieces, before taking on larger commitments. Conversely, some contacts are removed when a doubtful authentication case undermines trust.

Pre-purchase verification

No piece enters stock without prior verification. When sourcing is physical (market, auction, dealer visit), verification happens on the spot: markings, serial numbers, material and era consistency, joint condition, examination of any prior restoration. When sourcing is remote (European dealer, private seller via the form), we request a detailed photo file of the markings before confirming.

Three criteria structure the buying decision.

Traceable provenance. Can the seller document the origin of the piece? Identified first owner, documented estate, dealer who can name the previous seller, dated stock entry. Opaque provenance is not a deal-breaker on its own if markings are unambiguous, but opaque provenance combined with uncertain markings leads us to pass.

Original condition or coherent patina. Overall condition must match the piece's supposed age. The leather of a 1968 Pierre Paulin should show a patina consistent with fifty-five years of use; leather that is too clean on a piece claimed as original is a sign of redo, to be confirmed or rejected. Conversely, wear marks that fit the piece's narrative are an indicator of consistency.

Design history relevance. Does the piece sit in a story we can tell? An unsigned chair without context is an object; a chair with a known designer, year and edition is a narrative. Our catalogue is built by narratives, not by stock.

Transport to the warehouse

Once a piece is bought, transport to our Paris workshop-warehouse is itself a technical step. Sensitive pieces (ageing leather, marquetry, glass tops) travel in a wooden crate or reinforced cover, with art-furniture specialist carriers. Bulky pieces (sofas, USM modular sets) travel in a dedicated van, with soft straps and padding. Standard pieces arrive through partner carriers used to signed furniture.

Insurance at declared value is systematic on every inbound shipment. A loss on a Pierre Paulin sourced in Italy is not financially trivial; covering it correctly is a condition of viability.

Light restoration: a philosophy of patina

Once the piece reaches the warehouse, restoration assessment follows one rule: keep the patina, do not mask. That rule turns into a few operational principles.

Leather. Nourishing with the right leather oil for dry leathers, gentle cleaning for soiled ones, refixing loose seams. No tinted cover-up: leather aged sixty years no longer has its original colour, and trying to chemically reconstruct it always ends in a plasticised result that shows immediately to the eye.

Wood. Surface cleaning, beeswax nourishing for ageing oak and walnut, refixing loose elements. Fine scratches stay: they are part of the object. A damaged veneer is restored only when its absence harms visual coherence; otherwise it stays as is and is documented on the product page.

Metal and chrome. Gentle cleaning, light polishing of pitted chrome to remove corrosion without flattening the surface. No reckless re-chroming: re-chroming a leather-and-wood piece turns a vintage into a new one, which is not our intent. On USM, by contrast, when a painted frame has been damaged in use, we repaint in the original RAL — painted metalwork restores cleanly and the editor still produces the same colours today.

Foams and fillings. Recover by a specialist upholsterer when fully collapsed, with original densities and coverings close to manufacturer specification. A Togo that has lost its shape goes to a Ligne Roset specialist upholsterer in our network, using the correct foams.

The general rule: intervene as little as possible, document what was done, never erase a wear mark that contributes to the value of the object.

Atelier photography

Once lightly restored, the piece moves to the photo station. The station is an indoor neutral volume, cream matte wall and plain floor, lit by a calibrated spot at constant colour temperature. The light is neutral, side or frontal depending on the piece.

Several views are systematically taken. A frontal full view, a three-quarter view to show the silhouette, marking and serial-number details, and details of the wear marks flagged on the product page. No cosmetic retouching: no scratch erasing, no leather re-saturation, no rebuilt background. If the piece has a mark, it is on the image.

This photography discipline is explicitly editorial rather than commercial. It converts more slowly than a retouched photograph, but it dramatically reduces returns and disputes.

Cataloguing and listing

Once the photography is signed off, the product page is written. It contains the following elements, in order. Identified designer and edition, estimated production date, precise dimensions, original materials, overall condition with mention of visible wear marks, recorded markings and serial numbers, documented provenance when available, bibliographic references (catalogues raisonnés, manufacturer archives) for major pieces.

The page is published in Draft status: visible internally, not public. It stays in Draft until final photography is signed off and the page has been proofed. The shift to Active follows a final visual check: image consistency, price consistency with comparables, presence of the certificate of authenticity in the file attachments.

The catalogue grows in this way, in short but disciplined cycles. About ten pieces a month on a normal pace, more when a major sourcing arrives in one block, less when inspection reveals that part of a lot will not pass verification.

Going further

To understand how we arbitrate between conservation and restoration in practice, see our circular economy page. For a practical authentication case, the identifying a genuine USM Haller article walks through concrete markers. For a trade project with a written brief (architect, hospitality, production), the trade page sets out the dedicated sourcing terms. To propose a piece to the gallery, the form on the sell page takes three minutes.