Yass - Ross's Relics

There are two kinds of store you want to find when you're conducting a day tripping adventure over the countryside.  The first is a higher end boutique like Merchant Campbell.  The other is an Aladdin's cave of wonders like Ross's Relics.

Situated on the main street of Yass, there's not an immediate amount of evidence on display to let you know what you're about to experience.  Ross's Relics is set back from the other shop fronts and that means he can line his goods up out the front.  Did I mention that one of my loves is restoring and upcycling cheap furniture?  This is a honey trap for people like me but, alas, I can't claim credit for this one - this was all Machete.

As we approached we noticed a shipping container on the right.  Machete observes from the entrance, "I'm not even going to try and go in there," he decides and I can't help but agree.  Machete is not built for compact spaces and the thought of him navigating a china-lined compact space is enough to make my credit card sweat.

And then we notice the shipping container on the left...which is guarded by an amazing carving of an eagle taking it to a snake (around $5000 if you're keen to own it).

Yeah.  This is but a taste of what's to come. I do not know Ross.  I don't know why he decided to go into retail.  But I do know that Ross made that decision and ran with it like a possessed motherf#cker.  There is no theme here.  There are cheap things.  There are expensive things.  There are collections of things and there are one offs.  What there is not is any rational explanation whatsoever for what is going on here.  It's staggering and overwhelming and my brain doesn't know how to feel about it all.  There are some pockets of the store where you feel like Ross was trying to gather all of a certain kind of thing in one place but inevitably he gave it away and went for a "fuck it, I'll just find somewhere that this will fit" approach.

Regardless of how or why, Ross's Relics goes on for rooms and rooms and rooms.

You can find all kinds of childhood relics - crockery that graced the tables of my friends and family in the 80s.  Not pretty enough for eBay but you know for sure that there are people out there in the world looking for these pieces to complete their parents' collection.

Ratings

Price point: $, $$ and $$$

Value for money: There are some absolute bargains.  And there are a lot of very reasonably priced second hand things.  And then there are some incredibly rare and expensive things here like this $1200 antique mirror:

  

Kid factor:  Not one for smaller children - if you let them run wild you should be prepared to pay for breakages. But older kids and teens will probably marvel at the sheer scale of this place and delight in the weird and wonderful.  If they don't like it, you can throw them in the chokey:

The positives:  If you're looking for a unique gift or you've been looking for something weird for a while, you will almost certainly find it here.  Check out this oversized cat carving:

The negatives:  If you're autistic, this place is going to quickly overwhelm you.  There's a faint smell associated with estate sales and there's way too much happening to be pleasantly processed in an orderly fashion.  Within moments of stepping inside you realise that overstimulation is only minutes away.

Machete rating:  You could spend far too long in there browsing and walk out with far too much.