Thread: Too many?

There are several ways to collect things that would differ from unchecked addiction.

When my friends start a collection, my advice is, after you've made your early mistakes from sheer puppy enthusiasm:
- keep a budget
- keep in mind that it's budget for a hobby, it's not self-sustainable, and not cashable
- quality over quantity, as quality pieces will always retain a modicum of value
- choose a theme, a common factor, to what you are buying and you will be even more satisfied. Well, a theme or two or three. But some guiding light.


For example, my themes are :
- An exhaustive "state of the art" : be it grinds, scales, origins, etc, I want one of each. Which means on the other hand that one rattler is enough for example. It's challenging enough
- The exceptional : be it exceptionally good or bad, I want eye-rising pièces. Things that challenge the above mentioned "state of the art". I'd rather spend the budget some spend on a Filarmonica on real gold for example. Or at the other end of the spectrum I love my "shitty early frenchies" that are so much crap it's funny. Hence my love for butterflies.
- Gustave Keller branded products


Some other examples : a friend who's also a Clément like me collects any and every razor with our common first name, and will go to extremes for that (which is why I'm so touched he actually gifted me one recently).
I know a Kabrand collector, the admin of the French CCC is very specific with "Le trophée Espagnolette", another good friend is an exotic kamisori collector, etc.

Find your thing, and it is not hoarding anymore, it's telling a story, and you might learn a lot.
And that does not mean you won't still have too much mind. You will definitely err along the way and will have too much on your hand soon enough.
( I mean I must have 50 razors or so I've been gathering along the way that were outclassed before I could do anything about them...)

But that's Michelin dining on the road, not fast-food binging