The aesthetics of Stanley hand planes

[Bill McNiel]

Alex,
This is a rather insightful and articulate post. Thank you for sharing your thoughts and observations.
Regards - Bill

[Jim Koepke]

I like the looks of a plane that's been used. And I will continue to use them. I'm not a collector. I like the the Stanley's because it's the devil I know.

To me the Bailey rounded sides look so much better than the flat top Bedrock style.

Usually when a tool with collector value pops into my shop, it is sold. The exception is if there aren't any good users available at reasonable prices. Heck, even a good clean user might get sold off over one of my rag tag broken down fleet. They mostly look a bit funky, but they do work well.

One recent example is a scrub plane purchased for a good price. It would be hard to find a beat up one at the same price. Though it may be on the low end of collectability, it will be used unless some collector thinks it is better than the one he has and proposes a trade. Especially if the trade includes a six pack of my favorite brew.

jtk

[Jerry Olexa]

Generally, the older the better in my opinion.

[Alex Liebert]

To me the Bailey rounded sides look so much better than the flat top Bedrock style.

jtk

I totally agree. Not sure if it's blasphemous to say here but this is a big contributor to why I find the Lie Nielsen plane quite ugly and awkward looking.