It’s a question that divides generations and creates a chasm between collectors in the same category: pursue the rising stars of today or the celebrated icons of yesteryear?

The tug-of-war between modern and vintage assets unfolds across various genres of collectibles, from sports cards and memorabilia to fine art. Different eras of assets can attract entirely different crowds of collectors, and they also present different risks, opportunities, and, often, prices. Join us as we explain the meaning of modern and vintage assets in each category and explore their  distinct differences.

What’s the distinction between modern and vintage assets?

While there are rarely universally agreed-upon dates that separate modern assets from vintage assets in a given category of collectibles, collectors generally share an approximation of the lines that divide eras.

Fine art — due to its unparalleled tenure — boasts perhaps the most intricate categorization. While collectors and art historians alike could take a highly granular approach, grouping assets by movement, a simpler approach involves evaluating how the works are grouped when sold:

• Old Masters. Generally refers to European artists spanning from the Renaissance to 1800.
• Impressionist & Modern. Refers to art produced in the 19th and 20th centuries by artists born mostly in the 1800s.
• Post-War and Contemporary. As the name suggests, this category encompasses work produced after WWII to the present day. Notably, there is often a subcategory of 21st-Century or Ultra Contemporary works produced by established living artists or rising artists.

In sports memorabilia, the distinction is often more binary, with collectors drawing a line in the early 1980s that separates vintage assets from modern ones. This line materialized largely due to the increased sports-card production that took place in the 1980s and beyond. Some collectors prefer a more granular categorization, though these lines will likely shift with the passage of time:

• Pre-War Vintage. Assets produced before the Second World War.
• Vintage. Assets produced from the mid-1940s to the mid-1980s.
• Modern. Assets produced from the mid-1980s to the late-2000s.
• Ultra-Modern. Assets produced from the late 2000s to the present day.

Watches carry looser distinctions, with vintage watches generally thought to be those more than 20-30 years old and antique watches aligning more closely with what might be considered pre-war in other categories. In wine, the word “vintage” carries an entirely different meaning altogether, referring to the year in which a wine’s grapes were harvested. Still, collecting tastes can vary for wines that were more recently harvested versus those that have been cellar-bound for decades, with the balance between collectibility and drinkability sometimes complicated by a wine’s optimal drinking window.

What are the advantages of collecting vintage assets?

Over the passage of decades, items are often lost or damaged. This natural erosion of supply in strong condition creates a scarcity of vintage assets that often promotes their desirability and value. Importantly, that scarcity is rarely diminished. Artists of vintage eras have long since passed, which means they’re no longer producing works, and new supply is unlikely to be discovered. Similarly, while it does happen on occasion, we don’t often see vast troves of pristine rookie cards from the 1950s unearthed. Supply of vintage assets typically moves in only one direction: down.

The rarity conferred by vintage assets is what enabled William Koch’s wine collection to produce over $28 million in sales at auction in 2025, even as the contemporary wine market struggled. So rare were the collection’s large-form vintages of the 1980s that collectors simply couldn’t pass up the opportunity to bid, as they didn’t know when the next opportunity might come.

The advantages aren’t limited to supply, however. In some cases, pieces of memorabilia or works of art can be tainted by an association with a celebrity or artist who has garnered a negative reputation. As the figures associated with vintage assets are often deceased or older in age, their story is already written, and that reputational risk is reduced.

Similarly, the historical significance of these items has already been established, with their impact clear in the decades of pop culture that followed. Many of the most headline-worthy sales in recent years have been extremely rare vintage items. For example, Babe Ruth’s “Called Shot” jersey sold for $24 million, and Dorothy’s ruby red slippers from The Wizard of Oz sold for $28 million. Babe Ruth’s place in baseball history is cemented, while the significance of The Wizard of Oz continues to echo through even the most popular cinematic releases of today. That indisputable significance provides insulation from the volatility of the broader categories.

What are the advantages of collecting modern assets?

By collecting modern assets, collectors can express their belief in an athlete, musician, or artist’s rise to legendary status before that story fully unfolds. In some cases, being early to that belief might allow collectors to acquire assets at favorable prices, positioning themselves for significant appreciation should their thesis come to fruition. These assets are coming to market in an era where the importance of authenticity and provenance is recognized and prioritized. Collectors can act with greater confidence if their assets are purchased via the proper channels. Similarly, because of the younger age of these assets, condition is typically a lesser concern than it would be with vintage assets.

Modern collectibles may also curry greater favor with younger generations who more readily identify with them. Those favorable demographics may ensure that robust demand awaits in the event of a sale or that heirs will take a greater interest in becoming stewards of the collection. For instance, the recent popularity of events like Fanatics Fest demonstrated the active nature of the market for ultra-modern sports cards and the growing audience that covets them.

What are the risks of collecting vintage assets?

Many of the risks of collecting vintage assets are reflected inversely in the strengths of modern assets. Setting aside the most iconic, rare, and coveted vintage assets, some of the subject matter associated with vintage assets loses cultural relevance over time, particularly as younger generations rise to prominence. One need only look at the lagging performance of Modern Art, Impressionism, and Old Masters in recent decades relative to Contemporary Art to see this reality play out in practice.

Younger generations care about Babe Ruth, but will they care about Warren Spahn? They care about Claude Monet, but will they care about Alfred Sisley?

To the extent the popularity of vintage assets fades, collectors will face a tepid market upon sale or discover that heirs have little interest in inheriting a collection.

Vintage assets also come from an era when fewer processes were in place to ensure robust provenance and authenticity. For sports memorabilia items, there were no stringent processes for witness-based authentication, no holograms, and few high-resolution photographs to enable consistent photomatching. Babe Ruth’s signature is known to be a frequent target of forgery, and he’s only one of many. While modern assets are by no means immune to the same vulnerabilities, there is a greater availability of reliable channels for acquisition. This weakness makes it imperative that vintage collectors purchase only the most reliably authentic items, backed by ironclad provenance and the most stringent authentication methods available.

Finally, collectors may not experience the same opportunities for sharp appreciation as their modern-collecting peers. As the historical significance of their items is already well understood, the prices often reflect it, making it more difficult to achieve shorter-term financial gain, even if the best assets do appreciate in the long term.

What are the risks of collecting modern assets?

While enterprising collectors might often purchase modern assets with hopes of significant appreciation, speculative appetites in those assets can sometimes make attractive entry points difficult to attain. Take, for example, the speculative activity in ultra-modern sports cards in 2021 and 2022. Cards for the likes of Joe Burrow and Justin Herbert — quarterbacks who have yet to win a Super Bowl or MVP — sold for in excess of $1 million. A collector is left to wonder, then, what those athletes can possibly achieve in their careers to justify those values. Many will come to the conclusion that even the best outcomes are already priced in at those levels.

Along similar lines, modern assets can experience more volatility than their older peers. This chasm in volatility is evident in art, where, even though older categories have delivered lower absolute performance, they’ve done so with less volatility. Similarly, the market for coveted, modern watches skyrocketed in 2021 before cratering for much of the next two years. The same trend roiled the contemporary fine wine market in 2022 and 2023.

Collectors of these assets should be prepared to endure significant bouts of volatility and stomach-churning drawdowns, particularly after periods of intense strength.

While broad-based price action can challenge modern collectors, so too can idiosyncratic developments relating to the subject matter of their assets. The reputational risk that vintage collectors are largely sheltered from is a veritable danger to modern collectors, with their preferred star capable of falling out of favor with the general population at a moment’s notice.

Finally, supply growth presents a significant risk to collectors of modern assets. While modern collectors seek rarity in certain oeuvres for art, in significant moments for memorabilia, and in artificially scarce products for trading cards, the continued arrival of new supply to the market can dampen the appeal of their assets. Living artists will continue to produce works. Top-tier athletes will continue to wear new uniforms. Card companies will continue to print cards. Those realities heighten the importance of identifying assets that aren’t easily replicated or even approximated in their significance.wsed