Collectors of country antiques will enjoy a visit to Time Juggler on Lee Street. (By Penny Goldstein for washingtonpost.com)

So George Washington slept here, dined here, networked here. More to the point for antiques collectors is that George Washington must have shopped here.

Shopping for antiques in Old Town Alexandria makes it easy to imagine the bonanza in the 18th century, when ships carrying tobacco to England returned to the colonies with a cargo of Georgian furniture, silver, porcelain and Chinese export wares. Those goods, combined with the products of local cabinetmakers, potters and silversmiths, provided the founding fathers with a caliber of style that has rarely gone out of style, at least not around here, where Federal and Colonial Revival homes practically demand mahogany furniture and famille rose porcelain.

Where Tradition Rules
A number of antiques shops in Alexandria carry American and English 18th- and early-19th-century period furniture and accessories. Coincidentally, many are on Washington Street. Lucky collectors might even find a few pieces here with a local provenance, such as the circa 1760-1775 walnut desk recently offered at Sumpter Priddy III, Inc. (601 S. Washington St.), which was probably made in Alexandria or Georgetown. Brockett's Row (303 N. Washington St.) recently offered a Federal mahogany secretary-bookcase inscribed by Julian Ingle, son of Alexandria cabinetmaker Henry Ingle, who built George Washington's coffin.

If pricey Federal furniture is beyond your means, visiting these shops can still be worthwhile. Some also carry later-19th-century tables, breakfronts, chests and chairs in revival styles that have a similar look for a fraction of the price of an 18th-century period piece.

An Eclectic Mix
But suppose your taste is far afield of formal tradition. What will shoppers with casual or eclectic tastes find in Alexandria? The country look is well represented in several shops. Try Rocky Road to Kansas (215 S. Union St.) for a large selection of antique and vintage quilts, and the cluster of shops at 210 N. Lee St. for everything from primitive furniture and folk art to collectible costume jewelry.

At Cielo Antiques & Accessories, no period or style is off limits (By Penny Goldstein for washingtonpost.com)

For French antiques, country and formal, check out the 1000 to 1600 blocks of King Street. At Castle Swan, which Nancye and Robert Cassell opened last fall at 1007 King St. You can buy Roseville, Weller, Hull, and McCoy pottery as well as French furniture and vintage mink coats.

Robert Bartos is another newcomer adding an eclectic taste to Alexandria's antiques scene. He has transformed the historic Duvall House (305 Cameron St.) – George Washington imbibed here – into El Alcazar, a shop featuring continental antiques and fine art mixed with folk art, Orientalia and garden furniture.

Future Antiques
If you're a younger collector hoping to get an edge on hot antiques in the 21st century, visit Cielo (102 N. Fayette St.), where a collective of designers will inspire you to see the fun – if not the glamour potential – in an offbeat collection of mostly not-so-old furniture. At Funk & Junk (106 ½ N. Columbus St.), you can pick out an outfit for your next '60s theme party. Rhinestone-studded, cat-woman eyeglasses run $75 to $95; Hawaiian shirts sell for about $35. With so much plastic and polyester here, it's about as far from the Mt. Vernon look as you can get. But then, George Washington never had the pleasure of knowing "The Mod Squad."

Trip Tips
A map available in many of the shops lists contact information and business hours for 48 antiques and collectibles businesses in and around Old Town. While several shops are clustered near each other, covering them all will require moving the car a few times, which you'll have to do anyway, since parking meters have a two-hour limit. [There are several parking lots in the area for more extended stays.]

Beyond Old Town, two shops in the 2300 block of Mt. Vernon Avenue in the Del Ray neighborhood, and the 20,000 square-foot Thieves Market and neighboring shops south on Route 1, also offer a wide assortment of antiques and collectibles.

Penny Goldstein, an avid collector and certificate candidate in the appraisal program at George Washington University, writes frequently about antiques.