Sanjeev, Nekrodave and I took a road trip down to Denver PA for the November 13-14 auction of the Mark Solondz Collection.
Organized by ToyboxDX, the auction contained thousands of toys in hundreds of lots.
With our hardcover catalogs in hand, we set out early Thursday morning. The ride down was uneventful, despite numerous traffic Jams. Before heading out to the hotel to check in we decided to go straight to Morphy's to check out the goods.
Morphy's Auction House is in Denver PA, just outside of Amish country. An unlikely location for such an auction. The building is a nondescript red and tan warehouse with a fancy digital sign indicating the location. We enter and immediately run into Ed Sanford (Robot-Japan) and Warren Schwartz.
The auction house is a cavernous building, with rows of glass display cases on either side. There are all kinds of items on display, with two rows reserved for this auction.
Immediately it is clear that there is a hierarchy here, based on the perceived value.
On the right there is the tin. Each tin is meticulously displayed and labeled, both toy and box standing tall and proud.
On the left is the diecast.
The aisle of diecast is both glorious and disheartening. Each lot is in a bin or on a cardboard tray. The pieces are not in their boxes, they are loose in the bins, with parts laying around freely. In some cases, toys are just piled onto one another. Others, like the Big Scale Yamato, are just resting on their sides in cardboard boxes. These are clearly seen as not as valuable of the tins.
Lastly, against the wall is a series of rooms with glass doors. Inside these rooms is the vinyl, just piled into shopping bags with a lot number on them. The vinyl gets no respect here.
I take this opportunity to ask a woman at the desk to open a cabinet, as I want to inspect one of the items I am thinking on bidding on – the DX Dairugger XV. In the catalog it is listed as missing antenna, but upon closer inspection, they are actually there. However, one problem is apparent – one of the fists is broken, and the broken off part is missing. So all is not as it seems with these items, another benefit of coming in person.
We did our time at the auction house, and then went back to the hotel to check in. We decided to stay in King of Prussia, close to Machinesoldier’s house at a budget hotel which is actually not that bad.
Tired, we soldier on, and make our way to our next engagement. Mark (aka Machinesoldier) has graciously volunteered to host all of the visiting dignitaries at his place for a party. The place was full of all-stars.
Alen Yen
Matt Alt
Robert Duban
Erik Sjoen
Chris Hill
Jim Maitland
Joshua Fraser
Mark Gradwell
Sanjeev Selvaraj
Warren Schwartz
Dave Keymont
Mason Fitch
Jason Jakubowski
Also some new faces were present, like diecone who traveled in from NYC.
Pizza and beer were had, and some old friends met for the first time. It’s amazing how a community can make you feel like you’ve known someone for years and never have met. While this was going on, there was an anticipation in the room.
Alen brought goodies.
First off, he unveiled his Nekobot USB robot. This little guy is made out of hard rubber, screen printed, and separates at the chest. Inside is a 2gb USB stick that when plugged in, makes the heart logo light up. These will be on sale soon.
Next – vinyl. Alen had the guys from Gargamel make a Nekosaur vinyl! The thing is so cool – he had both clear and flesh colored test shots to show – I can’t wait for these to drop.
Finally – the crowning achievement – the Nekosaur Chogokin. This was just a resin prototype, but it looked fantastic. Firing fists, foot weapons, firing head, detachable scrander,missiles… it just looked awesome, and will fit right in with your chogokin collection. Release date is TBD.
As much fun as we were having, we all knew we all had to be up early the next day for the Auction. We all signed each other’s books like they were Highschool Yearbooks, and we went off our separate ways until tomorrow….
Comments
18 comments postedDamn Josh! I really wish I attended, why couldn't have this auction gone down 2 years ago when I had loot! I would have really wanted those valk re-issues as well as the Super O and Elintseeker. Any idea of what those went for? Last question, did everything actually sell?
-Dan
CollectionDX LLC
Vice President/Co-Owner
Well, after day 1, there were 5 lots that did not sell, but they were quickly snapped up (at a massive discount, 75% off the opening bid, I think) the next day. I'm not sure if anything didn't sell on day 2.
You can see the auction results here.
"This must be settled the way nature intended....with a vicious, bloody fight!"
Onyx Blackman
Principal, Flatpoint High
How 'bout a little more info on who and what the Mark Solodnz Collection is for us not in the know please. Thanks
Grandzinga....
More info tomorrow...
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CollectionDX Admin
Looks like it was a fantastic event to attend, what with seeing the toys and all the other fans.
As someone who won a few smaller auctions, its a bit disheartening to see the comments about how inaccurate the descriptions were in some cases. I assumed there would be some glitches in an auction of this size but stuff like you described ("missing" antenna actually there but fist broken) seems a bit extreme. I'm hoping there are no nasty surprises when I receive my shipment.
It was also shocking to see the fees. Just one of our items has a shipping fee that is 340% of the winning bid! Holy &$@#!
My parents live in Valley Forge, right next door to KoP. How about that...
I support Grandzinga petition, I´ve been folowing the coverage of the Morphys auction for the past few days, but I´m curious about who this Mark Solodnz guy is??? Can some one please enlighten us... And how the hell he end up whit this huge collection, and last but not least, WHY did he sell it???
Great trip BTW...
Greetings form Venezuela.
Awesome coverage, Josh! I'm glad you guys were getting footage, because I failed to photograph anything.
Machinesoldier was a great host, and I'm sure all will go over to the "Summit" gallerys for a photo years ago, of JoshB giving the TRON arcade game at the very same party house a little special lovin', WAH-Haha! I know I'm gonna pay for this.
And Dan, hit me or mcfitch about some airplanes.
"Hugging"... or humping? O.o;
Can ya blame him either way?
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CollectionDX Staff
Someone please put me out of my misery for missing this momentous event:(
The SOC's went for CHEAP!!
Great coverage :)
I wish I could have gone to this one man. I was so disapointed to see that the auction fell on those dates :(
Ok- I really hate to be the first to ask. Will we ever find out what the hell Dave is babbling about that "just came up" to distract him from bringing his "yearbook" and which prevented him from bidding??? Sounds like Sanjeev is not so optimistic that you'll ever hear back about whatever it is. I truly cannot grasp going in person to an auction of this size and not bidding on items?!
We must know
Grandzinga....
It's really not that hard to guess, if you know what I collect. :) Besides, there wasn't too much at Morphy's that really had me drooling anyway. The only jumbo there that I needed (Reideen) actually was missing the blade from the shield hand and the stickers were a bit discolored. So I would not have bid on it regardless of any thing else. Other than that, I wanted the Supersol Kanegon and actually did bid on it, but it was a low bid that I knew would lose. I just wanted to raise my hand at least once! LOL. And I would have loved to get the Ninja Arashi set, but Sanjeev was already bidding on (and won) it. Scoring some of the modern vinyl lots would have been nice, but most of that stuff isn't hard to get so it wasn't hard to let it go. All in all, I went for the fun, not the loot.
"This must be settled the way nature intended....with a vicious, bloody fight!"
Onyx Blackman
Principal, Flatpoint High
Well, just in case you didn't guess before, I was bidding on a couple of Jumbo Machinder villain boxes, a Green Ghost C3 one in particular. But it sold for roughly $3,350 and I lost. :( So, now I'm really, really regretting not bidding more at Morphy's. The timing of everything was just so bad and I ended up with nothing all around. :(
"This must be settled the way nature intended....with a vicious, bloody fight!"
Onyx Blackman
Principal, Flatpoint High
Mark Solondz, a New Jersey-based collector who “flew under the radar for years and made very smart buying choices,” according to Dan Morphy Auctions’ owner and CEO Dan Morphy.
“Although both Mark and his collection later became very well known, he formed the core of his fantastic collection quietly, and made many trips to Japan to purchase superhero toys that were not available to buy in the United States,” said Morphy. “We believe it is the largest single-owner robot, space toy and superhero collection of its type ever to come to auction. It stands apart from any collection we at Morphy’s have ever seen before because it contains so many of the great die-cast pieces made by Bandai offshoot “Popy,” in boxes with Japanese writing that are so desirable to collectors.”
The comprehensive sci-fi toy collection of nearly 1,500 lots was consigned by Mark
Why did he sell??? I don't have that answer!
Grandzinga....
Liquidating for a divorce, unfortunately. But he promises to put an even greater collection together down the road.
OUCH!!!! I just read some posts that sum up the reason for Mark to sell.... Lawyers and Divorce! Damn that sucks beyond belief!
Grandzinga....
Yup...divorce sucks...but a vindictive ex is even worse. Well, that said, Mark is an amazingly up-beat guy. He not only knows his toys, but he isn't even remotely thinking of quitting collecting. Now, that's a positive attitude!
Anyway, despite making out like a bandit, I also went for the chance to hang out with TBDX/CDX/skullbrain luminaries. It was really great to see a bunch of folks I've only met once or twice. And, of course, brand new faces were great to see: Mark K from skullbrain and diceone of TBDX also attended the machinesoldier afterparty.
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Sanjeev