Buying vintage design furniture in Nantes

At Rezé, Le Corbusier completed the Maison Radieuse in 1955, the second Unité d'habitation built in France after the one in Marseille. People still live there, the co-owners look after it, and its show flat is open to visitors. Nantes also turned its industrial island into a creative quarter, which drew a population with an eye for design.

We meet two kinds of seller there. The modern apartment blocks still hold original furniture, bought for rooms of a precise size. In the regenerated quarters, a younger crowd buys and sells a lot, often when they move. As pieces change hands, mixed assemblies turn up, such as a USM built from modules of three origins.

What we look for first

• We look first for anything from the Maison Radieuse and the other modern apartment blocks around the city, where the building dates the furniture.
• There is a lot of USM Haller in private homes in Nantes, and when a set has grown piece by piece, we untangle it before we value it.
• We also take sixties Scandinavian furniture, widely sold in western France, and pieces from the île de Nantes, checking their integrity when they have changed hands several times.

1. 01

   Photographs

   Send us overall views, the marks, any wear and the dimensions. You can attach the photographs straight to the form at the foot of the page.

2. 02

   Valuation within 24 to 48 h

   We value from photographs wherever the piece is, so distance makes no difference to how quickly we reply. The valuation comes with an offer of outright purchase or consignment.

3. 03

   Collection

   In Nantes, we arrange collection, and on an outright purchase we pay for it. A specialist carrier or one of our own runs handles it, and you have nothing to pack or dismantle. The 385 km or so from Paris go into our calculation, and we confirm the timing with the offer.

4. 04

   Payment

   On an outright purchase, we pay by bank transfer on the day of signature, within 48 working hours at the latest, and never in cash above legal thresholds. On consignment, you remain the owner until the sale, and we take a commission agreed in advance.

We can also come and value in person, usually from five pieces or for a configuration of real value. We work from Paris and Auxerre, and we have no establishment in Nantes.

• USM Haller, every year and colour
• Ligne Roset, including the Togo collection
• Cassina, original editions and documented reissues
• Knoll, American and European editions
• Castiglioni, Charlotte Perriand, Jean Prouvé, Vico Magistretti
• Italian mid-century from the fifties to the seventies, Scandinavian and Nordic modular systems

We leave aside mass reissues made after 2000, copies and pieces that cannot be identified, pieces too damaged to restore, and furniture with no design interest.

My USM is made of modules bought separately. Is that a problem?

No, it is just useful to know. A set built up over time is worth less than an original one, but each genuine module keeps its value. We separate the original USM, the genuine parts from another generation and anything that is not USM at all, and the valuation follows that split. Our appraisal page explains the method.