Collectability
Many early point blankets have survived into the 21st century and have become collectors items. The Oregon-based sculptor Marie Watt (part Seneca) has used point blankets in her sculpture work, which was exhibited in 2004 at the National Museum of the American Indian in Washington, D.C..
Nowadays genuine point blankets have become very collectible and could fetch prices up to thousands of dollars. The main determinants of value include age, size, colour, pattern rarity and condition. According to HBC Heritage Services, eBay is a good place to check current market values. Particularly collectible point blankets are the Coronation blankets; the one produced for the 1953 coronation of Queen Elizabeth II brings approximately $600 if in mint condition while examples of the even rarer, Coronation blanket dating to 1937 have sold for as high as $1300.
In 1890, HBC began adding labels to their blankets because point blankets of similar quality were being sold by HBC competitors from such manufacturers as Early's of Witney.
Harold Lee Tichenor, point blanket collector and consultant to Hudson's Bay Company has written two books on point blankets and their collectibility: The Blanket: an Illustrated History of the Hudson's Bay Point Blanket (HBC, 2002) and A Collector's Guide to Point Blankets (Cinetel, 2003)
Read more about this topic: Hudson's Bay Point Blanket