That’s such a sweet story.
I forgot to mention i still collect comics. Nonstop reading material.
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I must admit, reading about these collections had me oiling and cleaning my steel for a few pictures, coming up soon.
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Well, started today my maintenance and couldn’t stop myself from showing some pics
Here is the garage wall, with most of my steel and synthetic bladed weapons. All blunts but for the rifles officer 1854 pattern on the very right by the bicycle (which was service sharpened back in the day, From the left, a 1796 infantry sabre, two longswords (synthetic and steel) basket hilt broadsword, sidesword, montante, steel basket hilt backsword, katzbalger, XVII century style rapier and dagger, foam sabre and plastic tomahawk at the top (for training naval combat). Behind the big Montante guard in the middle there is a Scottish dirk replica.
Here the rest of them, of which I had worked on already. Two synthetics at the top (basket hilt replica and langmesser) and on the bottom left my very first sword, a replica (cheap Chinese stuff, bought to me by friends in a shop in York for my first birthday in the UK back in 2003) from Highlander, and on the right my Fetherschwert, a training/competition longsword weapon.
My second sword, a bokken, from my couple of lessons in Kenjutsu from the mid 2000s. I removed the plastic tsuba (guard) as I think it made it look really cheap.
My antique, an 1854 pattern Huntingdon Rifles officer sword from 1856.
It is that time of the year where it needs a good clean. I love the design on the blade and the golden proof at the base of the blade (within the six pointed star). Made in Pall Mall, London, by Cater, in 1856.
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Lovely! I lust slightly after a late cavalry sword, a Pattern 1908 or 1912, but I’m unlikely to do anything about it.
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My son has informed us that my Father in Law who has collected everything (including Samurai swords) has now bought 2 muskets!
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I must admit I don’t really like much the design of those patterns, so thrust-centered in their design and with the pistol grip handle, but I recognise they have a lot of historical gravitas (the claim fir the first war victim of WWI and last official design used in war by British troops). I haven’t seen any on his website, but contact Matt Easton from Scholagladiatoria Youtube channel (and fencing school) if you are interested in getting one.
If I am honest, I’d rather put my money aside for a 1796 light cavalry sabre or an 1803 infantry officer sabre, and if money was not an issue, I’d go for a 1796 heavy cavalry officer’s sword, they are proper beasts and Sharpe used one. But mainly because I have already he Victorian period covered with mine, and I’d love something from Napoleonic times.
I used to have a Napoleonic era light cavalry sword. It was in a right state but a collector bought it for quite a bit as apparently it was quite rare for some reason (that I don’t really recall - something to do with the makers stamp, I think).
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1796 pattern light cavalry sabres are very valued. They were very good swords, and between troopers swords, officers and yeomanry, there have been enough going to keep the hype. Very inspired by the hussars designs from the Austrian-Hungarian Empire, they became sort of the go-to sword for collectors. If yours was a stamped one and needed only minor to middle restoration, I can see it going for a few hundred quid very easily, specially if it was not a trooper basic sword.
There are several shelves in our household that qualify as collections in a way–although the biggest is definitely the games.
My curated shelf of “important” cookbooks. I have more but these are the ones that need to be close-by. I regularly remove unused books from the shelf and I purged about a meter of cookbooks last year completely (there are is another meter of cookery books distributed in my office and around the kitchen). The most important one is the slim black volume lying on top of the other books, that is my handwritten collection of all the best recipes I’ve encountered (it already includes the crumpet recipe someone posted at the beginning of the pandemic although I keep failing to make the perfect crumpet). The other one lying on “top” is a book of scottish baking recipes. The two oldest ones on the shelf are the GU Italian one and the brown GU baking book. I’ve had those since the 90s. The 4 volumes on the right are my bread baking books. But I can already see several books leaving the shelf soonish.
We don’t really collect whisky, we buy it to drink it. However, we keep some of our favorite bottles on the shelf once they are empty. Last year I removed about 20 or 30 whisky bottles to make the remaining ones more cherished. Although there are still more than I care for, but it is not all up to me which ones stay. The best bottle we’ve ever had is that Ardbeg Alligator (even though at the time I wasn’t into such whiskies so much, I was still able to appreciate that one). Most of these bottles have a story…
And this is not my collection but my partner’s (as much of it as fits on one picture anyway). He has been collecting DVDs (and Blurays) since The Matrix came out. Due to issues with degrading materials all of the DVDs have been backed up to our NAS. He insists I post the link to his collection as well. The collection (mostly) stopped growing when streaming services became available for which I am grateful.
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Hello fellow whisky fan! Funny enough I currently have two bottles of aberlour open at the moment, batch 65 of the abrundh, and a 11 year old from SMWS. I’d love to hear the story behind the 1980s glenfarcars.
I guess I’d better post a photo of my favorite empties now too.
There are distilleries I can spell, or distilleries I can pronounce. Never has there been one I can do both.
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Everyone I know who drinks the stuff refers to Bunnahabhain as “bunny bane”.
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I like the height, although I’m estimating that with a different kind of shelving there would be space for about 3 x 7 x 8 = 168 additional cases in that area!
This prospect worries me. I had one DVD (which I had previously watched in its entirety) fail on me in a manner which I finally understood was a problem with the adhesive between the disc layers – the first half was playable, and then no more. I take good care of the discs, and had always assumed that, as a physical medium, stamped discs were going to be extremely durable. I hadn’t realised that there was a dependency on some adhesives not breaking down…
I should learn how to do what you’ve done.
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It’s starting to look as though my answer would have to be “ukuleles”… 
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These are from a certain Swedish company…
As I said currently not much growth unless it’s collectible or unavailable on streaming services we frequent.
But a very tasty bane 
I have another a’bunadh and a cask strength special unopened somewhere hidden away. We visited the distillery twice and a’bunadh is among my absolute favorites. (edit: I realize that every a’bunadh is different and yet every single one I’ve tasted was brilliant)
The 1980 Glenfarclas isn’t really the most spectacular story, we got it for Christmas from my dad who had no idea what he was buying… it was quite the tasty drop though and tasted very much like a whisky you’d want for Christmas. We’ve also visited the pub in Aberlour where they have the Glenfarclas from every year since the 50s or so. Sometimes I open the bottles and sniff the memories.
Due to Scottish accents I think I can spell far more distilleries correctly than pronounce them, though I dare say Ardbeg and Bowmore aren’t that difficult
The best whisky story is yet to come but for that I’ll need to finish an open bottle first 
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@tomm_archer If you ever get tired of collecting band posters, you could start collecting movie posters… here’s one film you might like:
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From the same island you also have Bruichladdich which I am informed is “Brew-laddy” 
This chat takes me back to a distillery tour of Islay I did when I was 18.
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I can do worse. Our last Scotland trip was in 2017. We took the ferry from Amsterdam to be able to buy more whisky… from that trip come the Ardbeg Kelpie, the Laddie 21 and the Bunny Bane “Cruach Mhona” and some other 8 or 9 bottles.
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It’s almost been half a lifetime since I went. Seeing those photos I think I need to go back 
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Over the weekend I completed the finishing of our new shelves, put them together, and put all our mass market paperback fiction onto them, which comes to fourteen or fifteen shelf feet (more like thirty shelf feet if you consider the double stacking). I spotted a few volumes that need to be replaced because of wear and tear, including Panshin’s Villiers novels, Sayers’s Gaudy Night, and Vinge’s The Peace War.
Now C needs to pick ceramic pieces to go on top of the shelves. Probably larger ones that can best be appreciated from a side view . . .
Addendum: And now she’s chosen (though the one at the left was my suggestion):
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My wife and I sometimes go for a drive to visit distilleries when we have a chance (chances have dropped off dramatically since our wee one came along)
Think we’re up to about 21 or 22 now…
Though we never seem to have any bottles left to show for it though. We collect a glass on each distillery tour we go on - we’d been picking up 2 glasses and a miniature for a while, but not every distillery does miniatures and we were rapidly running out of space for glasses, so figured one each time would be plenty
Haven’t made it across to islay yet, but that’ll be a camping trip to come sometime
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