The sale of 389 Seventh Avenue, longtime home and business place of Italian barber Ercole Ricardelli, closed in May for two million dollars. Judged by the standards of today's unlikely real estate market , this seemed like a sweet deal for Hanshold LLC. Clover Barber Shop closed in 2008, and Ricardelli died last year at the age of 91. The shop is to be replaced by a wine store.
Yesterday Enright's Estates held the first day of an onsite three day sale. Contents: a world of personal and professional effects. Out on the sidewalk, and piled inside the 12th Street side garage the tools of a lifetime's trade of barbering and the contents of a family home.
A wealth of scissors, shaving brushes, straight razors, powders & boxes of dusty Pineaud hair tonics: Eau de Quinine, Eau de Portugal - "World Famous Since 1810." How intimate the objects seemed. You wanted to hold and examine them, but at the same time, it felt like an intrusive act. And the family things: a pair of tiny, rusted roller skates, the contents of a kitchen's cupboards, heaps of mens' (Enrico's, one assumed) clothing, papal memorabilia, a bed's ornate headboard. You wondered how you'd feel if your own belongings - trivial or prized - were put on display for public scrutiny. And still you looked. The child's car ride, the one the barber placed my son in after his first haircuts, was up for grabs at six hundred dollars - cheap at the price, we were told. Not for me.
But for old time's sake, I did want something to hold onto. Here are the treasures I came home with..
See Jeremiah's Vanishing New York on Clover Barber Shop here.
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