'Antiques Roadshow' guest starts tearing up after expert revealed the value of her storage cabinet

Since ''Antiques Roadshow" has demonstrated how old items lying around in the house or stored in the basement can be worth a fortune, people are turning up with things that don't conventionally count as artifacts. When a guest arrived on the show with a cabinet, little did she know that it was the work of a well-known architect and designer, Charles Eames. The guest who expected the item to be worth no more than $800 was left in tears by the show's expert, who appraised the storage cabinet at $20,000.

The guest shared how she got the item from a local auction. "I bought this at an auction from an artist who was well-known in the area. I was excited to go to the auction. I postponed a hernia surgery to attend the auction," she told the appraiser, Peter Loughrey. The guest added that she saw the cabinet in the preview and suspected that it was a creation of Eames. Once it was confirmed, she said she sat through the entire auction to buy the storage cabinet. Loughrey also confirmed that the piece of furniture was designed by the great architect, and it held some significance.

"The cabinet is designed by Charles Eames for the Herman Miller Furniture Company. In the original catalog from 1952, it was known as the ESU series, ESU standing for 'Eames Storage Unit,'" the appraiser explained. He further noted that the exact model was ESU 420-N and the "N" stood for the neutral color palette, the "400" the 400 series, and the "20" designation was for the drawers and door combination.

"It was designed at a time when manufacturers and designers were teaming up, and the best design minds were being paired with some of the best manufacturers," Loughrey noted. He further explained that the parts were custom-manufactured, and the cabinet had 341 pieces in total. "I counted them this morning," he said.

Loughrey further explained that the piece was sold as it was because assembling it was too complex for a customer. "So these all had to be made in the factory at Herman Miller in Zeeland, Michigan. They all had to be assembled there, then put in a large cardboard carton and a crate and shipped out by rail or truck in 1950 across the country to their destination. And that actually proved to be a little too expensive, and also the design of the item suffered in transit," he explained. 

He noted that there was a label in the drawer, which indicated that it was from the early 1950s. "The reason I know this is from between 1950 and 1952 is that in 1953, this entire cabinet was redesigned," Loughrey noted. "New legs were designed that were inset into the bottom. This version, which was commonly referred to as the first series version, has these original legs," he shared.

The expert then asked the owner how much she paid for the item. The owner shared that she paid only $15. "In 1952, these were about $200, which was fairly reasonable. In today's dollars, that would be about $1,700," Loughrey told the guest. While she was already amazed by the item's original price, she wasn't ready for what was about to come. "At the auction, which is probably the most common place that these would show up today, I think this would sell for about $20,000," he claimed.

The guest was gobsmacked by the appraisal as she said, "What!?" She then broke into tears of joy, saying, "I was going to be cool. I had no idea. I thought maybe $800."

In the end, the guest shared that she had one more cabinet like this and two small ones. "Oh, I had no idea," she said in the end.