DANIEL Sebastian looks like a rock star with his Chanel ear stud, jaunty neckerchief and ’fro – Lenny Kravitz, actually. But one wonders if the legendary guitar impresario could spot a genuine leather Chesterfield in a heap of junk at a car boot sale with the ease of the Clitheroe wheeler dealer.

Daniel, 48, was featured in the BBC series Del Boys and Dealers, originally a one-off programme.

But viewers loved the show’s contributors so much they commissioned a four-part series. Nobody would be surprised if a TV career beckoned for this giant of a man with an equally huge personality.

The 6ft 3ins Dominican talks the talk. From Northampton, he sounds more like Del Boy than the Cockney sparrer himself.

He also oozes the kind of market trader charm that makes ladies buy nylon knickers that fall apart in the first wash.

Even he admits: “I can sell sand to the Arabs.”

We meet at the vintage emporium home he shares with partner Joanne, a care worker, and three daughters.

Budgies are big in this household, in ornament form, adorning stylish wallpaper, taxidermified in ornate cages – there’s even a live one in the kitchen.

“I’ve always been into collecting things,” he says. “We didn’t have a lot of money growing up – me and my three sisters. If we wanted a pushbike we had to work for it or nick it. If I saw a mangled bike down an alley and I needed wheels, I‘d take them. I was always taught that you can make something good out of junk.”

From the age of eight he would accompany his mum to the auction house.

“She loved a bargain,” he said. “We’d go to Wilford’s and I’d be mesmerised by the grand arrangement of it all. She’d buy anything as long as it was cheap.”

Tragedy struck the family when Daniel was 14, his father was killed in a fire caused by a gas heater in his shed on his allotment.

“I took it very hard. I’d been a bit of a jack the lad before, always the joker, but I was bright. But I went completely off the rails. I started being rude at school and I’d constantly disrupt classes. The teachers understood and felt sorry for me, but I really didn’t want any sympathy. I was very very angry with the world and my dad wasn’t around to discipline me.”

When the school could control him no longer he was expelled and had to make his own living.

“Before I knew it I was the wrong side of the law. I was stealing and nicking clothes I couldn’t afford.”

From there it escalated into robbery and violence and finally a four-year stint in prison.

“I was considered a menace on the street, so I think they made an example of me. They were hard times in the 80s. There was a lot of racism and a lot of name-calling and being as I was then, I wouldn’t stand for it. But prison sorted me out. It was a blessing in a way although I hated it.

“Even at junior school I was 6ft 3ins, so I’d always been the big black lad with the big mouth. But in prison it was different.

“There’s always someone bigger and nastier than you and they were the roughest of the rough. You can never win in prison. I may have been a big fish in my pool, but in there I was a tiddler and I soon learned it wasn’t the place for me.

“I’m a different man now, more of a lover than a fighter and if anyone says anything untoward to me then I try to smoothe it all out with a smile and a joke.

“There are a million ways to get around violence. My advice to any young lad is ‘no matter what the situation don’t put yourself in that predicament’.”

When he left prison he worked in warehouses to buy a van and started buying and selling – legally.

He certainly has the eye for an antique bargain, pointing out an elegant Wheatsheaf table he says: “See that, it’s mid 20th century and would normally cost about 300 quid. I got it off ebay for £70.”

His knowledge of antiques and vintage is encyclopaedic, gleaned from years of reading up. And he’ll take a chance on almost anything even if it only makes him a few quid. “I love it. It’s my passion,” he says.

Daniel travels all over in his Afrojunk van which bears the slogan ‘specialists in the nicer things in life’.

He visits car boot sales, auctions and antique fairs.

He’s into old barber’s chairs. “Everyone’s into tattooing and they want the old fashioned chairs.

“I got a great Chesterfield from a car boot sale. It’s a classic. It was a bit mucky, but I can spot one a mile off.” Play your heart out Lenny Kravitz!