Essentially French

In my opinion, Spencer Swaffer is the most successful antiques dealer in the UK today. Before I joined the trade, my Suffolk friends, who had been a part of it for all their lives, used to regale me with their antiquing tales. They always spoke admiringly of Spencer, of his amazing eye and boundless energy.

FLOWER POWER
With any fair that you might visit across the UK and in France, too you can bet that Spencer has got there first, slapping his trademark `SOLD’ label onto the best of everything. The label depicts the front of his exquisite. bow-fronted Elizabethan shop in the centre of Arundel. West Sussex, which is where all his purchases end up before being sold to an international roster of discerning dealers, decorators and homeowners.

Born in Brighton, Spencer has dealt in antiques since the age of 12. He was a lonely child, kicking pebbles on beaches and hiking across the South Downs, collecting stones and shells on his way. Jumble sales were a dream come true for him, and he set up a museum in his bedroom to showcase his purchases. In 1962, the Home Service got wind of this peculiar little boy, and Jack de Manio interviewed him on the equivalent of the Today programme. A savvy antiques dealer heard the story and hightailed it to his bedroom door, where Spencer was charging 2d for entry to his museum. The dealer offered him £50 for a couple of his treasures, and the rest is history. Spencer’s parents died when he was 20; he sold their cottage and bought his present shop. That was in 1974, and he is dealing in Arundel to this day.

The shop is a most beautiful building, built in 1580 and originally an inn. Four floors are full of tasteful stock, and the turnover is fast. The same loyal staff have been with him for years; the sigh of a good boss. They are on first-name terms with all their clients, who are always welcomed with coffee, tea or a glass of wine, depending on the time of day. The garden out back is no less than breathtaking. Mature and well cared for, it contains a Romanesque font enjoying a second life as a fountain and garden statuary, creating the feel of a grand country house. The protective high brick walls - actually the walls of Arundel Castle - encourage a microclimate that allows subtropical plants to thrive.

Spencer’s  home, which he shares with his pretty, vivacious wife Freya, is grand, too, and also in Arundel, meaning that it’ s just a short walk to work. The majority of houses in the town are of red brick and 18th- and 19th-century construction, and Spencer’s detached double-fronted George I townhouse is no exception. With its shiny red door, white columns and palm trees, one might expect to find a formal interior, but, as with all antiques dealers, their homes tend to reflect their shops and stock, and Spencers’s conforms to this stereotype.

In all homes, from time to time, objects get replaced for purely aesthetic reasons, but in the homes of antiques dealers, this upgrading occurs with alarming regularity. Whenever a better model comes along, the old version is swiftly traded up and sent back to the shop. But there comes a time when change becomes less exhilarating, and in Spencer’s case, his home has reached perfection. Though sparser and more ethnic in feel than his shop, and with a distinct Bloomsbury touch, this is, without doubt, the home of the top dealer.

Double-fronted houses have a perfect symmetry - ask a child to draw a house and he or she will place the door in the middle, with windows either side. These houses are the most comfortable to live in, with plenty of ground-floor space and a choice of turning either lift or right on entering, giving a sense of balance. Off the hall to the right is the dining room, which has a simple, elegant bookcase, with soft gothic arches in the glazing. To the left is the comfortable Bloomsburyesque living room.

The kitchen is a continuation of the living room. If you feel grumpy. look up and read the large gilt letters stuck above the entrance: ‘S.M.I.L.E.’. How could you not? This house has a wonderful serenity - it is no surprise to learn that Freya practices yoga every day in the beautifully sparse bedroom in front of floor-to-ceiling windows fitted with elegant, colonial-style shutters.

Freya adores flowers. In the kitchen, there is a large collection of still lifes of posies and arrangements, many unframed. Maybe among these treasures is an undiscovered Vanessa bell? The lovingly tended garden at the back of the house is the source of the monkshood and sweet peas artfully arranged in confit jars and pots in the kitchen. The garden is not just ornamental -  the potager produces all the vegetables the Swaffers eat.

A few years ago, Spencer lost the sight in one eye, but he is never offended if anyone jokes that he’s always had a good eye. Perhaps it’s something to do with all the carrots he eats!