Thank you for shopping CameLots
By Beth Teitell
Thursday, December 2, 2004

So I was reading about the latest auction of Kennedy swag when I had an epiphany: This is Caroline's bridge collection.
     There were the sumptuous couture items belonging to JFK and Jackie that Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg and JFK Jr. put up for sale in 1996 - the fashion jewelry, the golf clubs, the $2.5 million engagement ring - and now she's offering up a lower-priced line for a new target market, kind of like when Martha Stewart started selling sheets at Kmart.
     Attention Camelot-obsessed shoppers: tchotchkes at Sotheby's.
     Whereas the first auction resulted in $34.5 million in sales, this one is expected to raise only about $1 million, although of course that number could go much, much, much higher - who's to say what a wicker basket brushed by a Kennedy hand might fetch?
     Not to quibble about any event that results in a second Kennedy catalog - this one is 380 pages, illustrated and a bargain at $50 - but think how much more delicious the event would be if Caroline were holding the tag sale not in a toney auction house, but rather at the Compound, with Jackie's housewares spread out on folding tables and upended milk crates.
     Harried Kennedy cousins would be running around taping price tags on wobbly chairs, negotiating with shoppers over chipped china sets, and directing the masses to the outdoor toilets. ``Aunt Caroline, this lady wants me to take another buck off the Life magazine, is that OK?''
     This second, B-list round of Kennedy items will go on view at Sotheby's on Feb. 9 and the sale will run Feb. 15-17. One Bostonian I know has already made her hotel reservations and has started a Kennedy-dedicated savings account, but she's worried about what she'll do with her anticipated haul.
     ``How would one display the Jackie Kennedy Mason jar?'' she asked.
     ``You can't actually use it, it would be like blotting up a stain on your skirt with water from Lourdes. But it would be so doofus in the living room.''
     And there's another problem with the Mason jar: how do we know it's authentic?
     ``I truly question whether any member of the Kennedy family touched the Mason jar,'' another woman told me. ``Are they trying to pretend they were bustling around putting up preserves for the winter ahead?''
     And even if they did, she added, there's just too much Kennedy stuff for sale now. ``It's not even going to be that special to own it. Your neighbor's going to have the Kennedy napkin rings and garbage can, your sister's going to have the Kennedy salt and pepper shakers and jar opener, your mother-in-law will own the Kennedy candlesticks.
     ``Soon, it will have all the cache of Pottery Barn.''
     Hey, that's not a bad idea. Note to Caroline: Once there's no more memorabilia left to sell, you can open up your own chain.
     Crate and Compound, perhaps?