Whatever you do, please don't call it a flea market.

Bill Neff screws up his face in insult at the word's mention from a folding chair on his outdoor lot at the Lakewood 400 Antiques Market in Cumming. He's lovingly tending to neat rows of brass doorknobs and pulls, most from the 1800s.

He and Larry Cook, who sells cast-iron hooks, weights and plaques in the next lot over, work in tandem, whether the routine is joking, selling or relaxing.

At a recent show, the two wore Hawaiian shirts, blazing white moustaches against sunned skin and laissez-faire, good-time attitudes that matched the spirit of this show. They sleep away each day's work in the comfort of their vans, sometimes after a few "longnecks" with the other dealers, Cook said.

Welcome to the start of antiquing season at Lakewood 400, a name that joins the old and new addresses of the beloved Atlanta antique show.

Held the third weekend of each month, this show, just off Ga. 400, was spun off from the sprawling Lakewood Antiques Market south of Atlanta, which shuttered in October 2006.

Ed Spivia, who launched the original show 20 years ago, sold the grounds to the city of Atlanta two years after opening this location, which he calls a cleaner, neater incarnation of the old market. Spivia said maintaining the slew of buildings and 117 acres of property on Lakewood Fairgrounds didn't come cheap. And business had begun to slow.

Meanwhile, Lakewood 400 boasts an 85 percent return rate among its 185 vendors, said Spivia and his wife and business partner Barbara, who expects to eventually double the number of vendors. But the new market has yet to keep pace with their goals, they say, citing the steep cost of gas for traveling dealers and the struggling economy.

In fact, nationwide, some shows feel buffeted by the economy, said Angie Becker, president of the Antiques and Collectibles National Association who lamented that the industry is aging, with younger people less interested in antiquing. However, "the high-end merchandise is still selling very well," she said.

With Lakewood 400, that's where the Spivias have put their stock.

A tour through the 19-acre property feels like a walk through American history. Most of the upscale items are inside a main building, a maze of 75,000 square feet housing everything from Chinese jade, "shabby chic" furniture and leather armchairs to guns and fishing rods, old vending machines and player pianos, mah jongg tablets and an autographed reproduction of a Marc Chagall painting.

Americana even comes in the most mundane of items, such as the assorted glass bottles in Jay Guest's booth.

"Bottles are part of history," Guest said, pointing out a row of purple bottles from the 1920s and the poison bottles, marked with ridges to alert the half-conscious reaching into medicine cabinets in the dark of night. Guest digs up some bottles from outhouses, where men would dispose of liquor bottles to hide their drinking from their wives, he explained.

Business remains steady for Guest, who's been in it for more than 20 years. He'll sell a plain bottle for a $1 —- some folks buy them to create colorful "bottle trees" outside —- and get as much as $35 for an embossed whiskey bottle from the 1800s.

On a larger scale, John Wilson might ask thousands for some of the furniture he displays here, relics from treasure-hunting treks through China on a riverboat. But the real show might be in the selling.

When a woman paused to admire a wood and marble plant stand mixed in with Neff's inventory, he threw out an offer for 20 bucks. The out-of-town shopper hesitated, wondering aloud how she would carry it on the plane ride home. Unflinching, Cook offered to unscrew the thing and "knock it flat." And when she replied that she lacks an extra suitcase, the game continued.

Cook's rejoinder comes in a snap. "We'll sell you one."