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There were lots of good finds in October including an Ivory handled Excelsior corkscrew, 2 silver overlaid tusk handled corkscrews, a marked Rodgers & sons corkscrew, a carved Indian head corkscrew, carved lion head corkscrew, and a Sterling roundlet corkscrew.     
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My girlfriend and I took a short weekend trip to Granbury (about an hour 45 minute drive from Dallas) in October. We stayed at an Airbnb right on the main square and happened to be there during Octoberfest weekend. We ate at all of the best restaurants and even made it to a few antique malls where I surprisingly found a corkscrew worth purchasing (a rarity these days).      It's been a while since I've done any blog posts, so I'm going to try to get caught up. I had these nice finds on eBay in September including a very nice Sterling silver handled decorative corkscrew, a couple Syroco bottle openers and corkscrew as well as a gentleman's grooming kit with some interesting family crests.     We were gone for two and a half weeks; flew into Paris for a few nights before heading to the ICCA meeting in Romania for a few nights, and finally to Burgundy for a little over a week. We had a great time in both France and Romania and got to see several old and new friends, eat lots of great food and wine as well as seeing (and buying) a lot of corkscrews along the way.           If you've never read the story about how our corkscrew addiction started then I will include it below, but during a recent trip to Paris, we visited the store where it all happened. The store has been in business since 1820 and is somewhat well known. We told the corkscrew origin story to the young store clerks who were less than enthused and they directed us to some less than interesting corkscrews that were for sale. Anyway, no corkscrews were purchased this trip, but it was fun to visit the store where it all started. It all started on a romantic date to Paris, France in the fall of 1986. Nancy Phillips and David Zalaznik roamed the streets of Paris darting in and out of shops and restaurants. At one point they entered a small store full of boxes with kitchen gadgets. It seemed more like a hardware store than a kitchen shop but they browsed anyway. The store clerk acted like he didn’t understand English then joked about the TV show “Dallas” and finally sold them two corkscrews. David was heard to say “Wouldn’t this be a neat thing to collect”. Later that evening David proposed to Nancy on the open deck of the Eiffel Tower. Ever so romantic but Nancy, the shrewd accountant responded “I’ll have to think about that”. So they returned to USA with a collection of two corkscrews and one unused diamond ring. Nancy finally did accept David’s proposal and in August 1987 they were married. They have been collecting corkscrews ever since. Wondering what the 2 corkscrews were? A French made Zigzag corkscrew and a French wood barreled corkscrew.      For the longest time I thought that we were the only corkscrew collectors in Dallas. That was, until I sold an item on ICCA auctions several years ago and was surprised to see that the address on the invoice was only a few miles away from my home. Intrigued, I sent a message to the buyer and invited him over pick up the item in person and to have a drink down in the wine cellar. We talked about corkscrews and got to know each other over some good wine. We kept in touch over the years and I was recently invited over to his house to see his new wine cellar and corkscrew displays. His collection consists mainly of Sterling silver roundlets and totals 150 or so corkscrews.    We recently returned from a trip to Mexico. There weren't any antique stores there, but I did have some nice corkscrews waiting for me when I got back. First is a beautiful carved ivory Corkscrew with Sterling end caps and decoration. Next is a phenomenal carved dragon corkscrew with Sterling silver tail followed by two boars tusk corkscrews with Sterling end caps; the first with a carving of a deer and the second with carvings of grape leaves.      Not everything that I purchase is a corkscrew. Oftentimes you have to purchase some bycatch (as I like to call it) in order to get that one rare corkscrew which happens to be in the lot. Usually it's something mundane like some old bottle openers, but occasionally you end up with some bizarre items. I haven't come across a large quantity of items lately, but certainly some of the most unique items that I've ever purchased. We have a cheese tray with a deer foot handle (should turn some heads at our next party), a deer foot knife sharpener, carved cane handle, carved bottle stopper, and an interesting pair of mother of pearl binoculars.     Not a huge amount of additions to the collection for May, but there are certainly some quality pieces. First is a Sterling silver perfume corkscrew inscribed with a family crest. Next is a beautifully decorated Sterling handled corkscrew with brush inscribed (H.B.F. Dec 25. 1885. & TH monogram); this one may make my Best 6 for the year. Next is a carved boars tusk corkscrew with Sterling inserts followed by a Sterling figural corkscrew. Finally is a bar mounted Cyklop corkscrew; one of my favorites of the more modern bar mounted corkscrews. Stay tuned, more great corkscrews are en route to the collection and offers on entire collections are pending.      I was sent a listing for an upcoming estate sale by a fellow collector a few weeks ago. The sale was located in Houston and the description listed a substantial corkscrew collection. A few days later when the pictures were posted, I noticed a couple of nice items including an army of Syroco full bodied corkscrews including clowns, monks, and indians all for $100 each. Other notable pieces include a rare Gundlach corkscrew (bottom picture is not mine, but added for reference since the corkscrew from the estate sale is barely visible). I made a fair offer for the Gundlach and offered some advice on the severely undervalued Syroco pieces, but was quickly turned down. Since it would be about a 9 hour round trip to attend the estate sale and with no guaranteed purchases, I decided not to attend, but hopefully the collection inspired some new corkscrew collectors to start collecting.     |
James ZalaznikI'm constantly adding new corkscrews to my collection. Any new finds as well as articles which may be of interest to corkscrew collectors will be posted here. Archives
January 2026
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