Decorative Art

IN a private sale negotiated by Christie’s, the Victoria and Albert Museum has acquired this remarkable 16th century tankard made for the Ottoman court.

THEY may look plain and simple, but this pair of silver wall-hanging candle scones had private and trade bidders clamouring to buy when they came up for sale last week at Colchester auction rooms Reeman Dansie.

THE 16-lot section devoted to Martin Brothers art pottery at Bonhams' latest Ceramic Design sale provided a number of the notable results.

A SET of four George II silver salts by the celebrated Huguenot silversmith Paul de Lamerie (1688-1751) sold for a double-estimate £19,000 at Hansons' latest sale at the Mackworth Hotel in Derby.

CHURCHILL impersonator Derek Herbert was in Towcester on March 16 to aid Northamptonshire auctioneer Jonathan Humbert in the sale of a pair of acetate tortoiseshell-effect reading glasses that belonged to Sir Winston.

HAMPSHIRE auctioneers Jacobs & Hunt of Petersfield achieved a new house record when they sold this 17th century Italian specimen marble plaque for £37,000 last month.

ON the evening of Tuesday, March 1 thieves broke into Willingham Auctions and stole four fruit-decorated Royal Worcester vases.

STOKE on Trent will shortly host the largest exhibition of Shelley and Wileman ceramics since the factory’s closure in 1966.

A PIECE from a celebrated but elusive porcelain service that turned up at the latest sale at Aguttes in Paris understandably caused great excitement.

ESTIMATED at $20,000-30,000, this Vezzi porcelain octagonal teapot and cover attracted great interest among European buyers at the latest sale held by Skinner in Boston.

TOP lot at Bonhams’ latest sale of English and Continental glass was this impressive 15in (40cm) high, early lidded punchbowl from c.1685.

ESTIMATED at £3000-4000, this 18th century mahogany decanter box retaining a pair of profusely cut double-magnum sized decanters c.1780, attracted multiple bidders at Suffolk saleroom Neal Sons & Fletcher of Woodbridge.

MODELLED as a brickwork kiln, this rare stoneware lampbase was one of only four hand thrown by Guy Sydenham to commemorate the pottery’s centenary in 1973.

PICTURED here is one of more than 100 polychrome Delft tiles, valued at hundreds of thousands of pounds, stolen from a leading collector in the Netherlands.

AN interest in wine and a holiday to Britain 49 years ago led New Englanders Alden and Connie Lank to their first silver wine labels.

WHEN auctioneer Mark Oliver climbed down off the rostrum after completing a 650-lot marathon double sale of British art and collectors’ pottery, Bonhams had netted just shy of £720,000.

THE famous Amen series of diamond point engraved Jacobite goblets, made c.1745-50, have long been emblems of Scottish nationalism. Yet it is widely assumed that the engraver of many of them was English.

THANKS to a clever bit of detective work by one of its curators, the Bowes Museum in Barnard Castle has been able to reunite a porcelain cup and saucer that have separated for over 200 years.

A COLLECTION of 85 bosuns’ calls was among items stolen from a home in Milan in early August. Most of the calls were British, but there were also examples from the USA, Italy, China and India.

THIS 8½in (21cm) English porcelain jug painted with a cavalryman on horseback probably dates from c.1817 when, following rioting in the spring, magistrates in Manchester decided to form the Manchester and Salford Yeomanry Cavalry.