O’Gallerie

I took a painting to be appraised and perhaps sold. The guy had no clue, went back somewhere to check it out and came back and said the value was $ 1000. I sent it to a gallery in Boston and it was sold for $ 7500. Stay away from this place.

About 3 weeks ago I bid on a jewelry item, in fact I was the only bid. It showed that I won. After 10 days of not hearing from them, I get an email telling me to bid again on the same item. I asked for clarification-​got none. I suspect someone who works there decided to abscond with my bid for the item. In other words, the employee or BFF wanted the item. Nothing even close to this has ever happened to me over the years of buying on auction. I asked them to remove my personal info, still get emails so I spam them.

This place is garbage! Everything is broken, chipped, or has fifth all over it! The employees don’t treat the goods with any care! Would NEVER come back!

Just attended a rug auction this evening and they had quite a large crowd. I was surprised by the number of items sold to online or telephone bidders. While that does not mean they didn’t stop in yesterday to view the items, it also might be true that they were buying based on description and photos. I have done that for auctions in London for books, but I never have felt comfortable without doing a personal inspection.
I first attended an auction at O’Gallerie a good 20 years ago and everything just keeps staying as it was, which is fine. You have viewing the day before and a couple of hours before the sale as well. As with anything purchased in this fashion, you better know your stuff or in a moment of insanity you might end up with an over-​priced curiosity piece you thought was really neat.
I’ve attended auctions for more than 40 years and have never used the rules everyone says you should. As in the case of this auction, I’ve been around Persian rugs quite a bit and have developed a good eye for what collectors will like, what average homeowners will like, and what I like. If I find myself bidding against a collector I always assume I am going to pay more than I would like, but as the discomfort grows with the rising price I simply bow out when it no longer feels right. That happened once tonight and was at the point of doubling the expected price for the rug, but that rug warranted the higher price. Of the two I did buy, one was over the estimate, which was too low in the first place, and the second was below the estimate, which was a reasonable estimate and I was lucky it was near the end of the sale.
Auctions are fun even if you do not buy anything or don’t get a bidder’s card for the sale. During the previews you get to see a whole variety things you might otherwise never come in contact with, and you get to develop an eye for quality (tonight I saw a painting on the wall that was, or will be, for sale, and I could swear it was an old paint-​by-​numbers, but was by a fairly well-​known artist that someone with far loftier tastes than mine would pay many hundreds of dollars for).
A fun place to visit, a good place to buy (if you know what you are doing), but as I observed this evening, probably not the best place to have kids running around or squirming in their chairs sitting through a long auction.
There is a 16% buyers fee added to the winning bid amount.

I have been bidding and consigning with O’galerie for over 6 years, My brother furnished his whole house with O’gallerie antiques. They have wonderful items, a great staff, and very good deals on jewelry and furniture.
i purchased two beautiful ruby rings from them and many decorative antique items, including my nicest brilliant cut glass vase. It is a lot of fun to go with friends to the live auction and bid from the gallery. It is tricky bidding on line so i would suggest going in person and looking at what you want to bid on. If you cant go to the auction you can can put an absentee bid for the item you want. I bid every month with O’gallerie and will continue to do so.

Online buyers beware!!! Photos are deceiving… The conditions are not well described at all. It’s a no money back policy but that is even more reason to provide clear and untouched photos. I bought a coin that was dipped, shined and polished. Pretty much worth less than half of what I paid.
To make matters worse, I didn’t realize I won it and they charged my credit card over $ 350 in late fees, restocking charges and lost commission. The coin was only $ 650. If they could charge my credit card the $ 350, they could have just taken the payment on the coin. That’s the idea of leaving my credit card… duh! They know and obviously do a nice business selling coins over and over again.
Stay far, far away!!!

Great auction house full of fabulous items, and you’ll probably find something that you can’t live without! The curators are super knowledgeable, scholarly and friendly, which is a rare combination. The span of styles and eras they specialize in, throughout their auctions, is expansive and eclectic. Best auction house in the region, hands down.
And if you ever have collectibles, antiques that you need to sell, you will NOT be disappointed in what happens with this team. Two seasons ago, I had to sell my brother-in-law’s collection of strange memorabilia and out of fashion Victorian antiques. I chose O’Gallerie because I had worked with them years before. And even though they did not sell all of his collection in the first possible auction, they exercised knowledge and patience, and they ran everything through, eventually, according to plans which proved superior for maximum profits. A month ago, I received what I thought was my last check, their payment to me after taking their percentage. But today, I received yet another payment from them for some old books and a chair they recently sold! Believe me, I could have NEVER sold all of that weird stuff the way they did, with their timing. It was SO worth it, letting the O’Gallerie team handle all that stuff. If you are thinking about hiring this seasoned team & selling through them, do it!

Well, I was shocked that this wonderful auction house did not have any Unilocal reviews! Have to remedy that with this:
In my work and personal life I frequent auction houses, country sales, estate sales, thrift stores and anywhere you can find interesting old stuff. Some of it I keep, a vast majority of it I sell.
BUYERS: To me it’s a testament to the quality of the items they take in for auction that everything I have bought I still have! We have a 1960s Honda Dream motorcycle (mega cool vintage bike), a great Smith & Wesson handgun, over 1 carat diamond earrings (what a buy), some vintage American pottery, and a fantastic Italian marble bust all of which we purchased over the last year from O’Gallerie. Their auctions are widely varied and sometimes are by theme or a particular persons estate or type,(i.e. dolls or art) but most often are a catchall with a lot of different kinds of valuable and interesting items.
SELLERS: I should also mention that I have sold items through their auctions before and I have been more than pleased with my return. If you are interested in having them auction things for you you need to call & talk with them and see if they are interested. If so, you make an appointment and bring the item (s) down to their location for them to look at in person so they may determine an estimated auction value. And you leave the items with them until sold. They will give you an idea of when the item will be up for auction and when to expect a check. Please keep in mind that this is NOT a weekly auction house, so be prepared that it may take some time to get your items on the auction block and a good bit more time for them to reconcile and generate your check — minus the commission paid to the house.
GENERAL: Auctions occur both in the daytime and the evenings. The day auctions are much more casual and (sometimes) have lower prices than the evening auctions, but in either case they move hella fast at both.
HELPFUL INFO:
In order to bid you need to provide I.D. and a credit card/​debit card and you will be issued a bidder number.
For day auctions, midway they have pizza for the crowd which is extra cool when the auctions sometimes go on for 5 hours, perhaps more. Today was a day auction and the place was reasonably full of serious buyers with pockets full of money. There were over 700 lots which means they are doing over a 100 an hour — like I said, things move fast around here!
The auctioneers & staff are professional and fall on the no frills side of the game due to the sheer quantity of their catalogs (the list of what is being auctioned).
If you aren’t too sure what you are doing, you should try & go with someone who is familiar with auction protocols. Or just go a few times alone to watch and you’ll soon get the hang of it.
Day auctions are not open to online bidders, though the night auctions always are.
Like all good auction houses, you can preview the items in person prior to the auction — check when the preview (s) are and get there so you can inspect the item prior to the frenzy of bidding.
In the end, I have nothing but kudos to hand this business — 5 stars!