Chelsea Porcelain

Sir Bruno Welby (b.1928), a member of both the English Ceramic Circle and the French Porcelain Society, has bought European porcelain since the 1950s.

The Sir Bruno Welby collection (see main story in this edition) sold at Woolley & Wallis shone the spotlight on two familiar names from the early English porcelain literature: Jefferyes Hamett O’Neale (1719/20-97) and Fidelle Duvivier (1740-after 1796).

On February 6 Woolley & Wallis is selling the Sir Bruno Welby collection of European porcelain. Estimates across 350 lots cover an affordable range from £50 to £2500 with the group as a whole expected to fetch around £100,000.

The 135-lot private collection of renowned porcelain specialist Rod Jellicoe revealed the current state of a market long after its ‘vintage era’'

Vases tell the story of an obsession to recreate a celebrated antiquity

This rare Chelsea porcelain leaf-moulded teapot and cover came between a goat-and-bee jug and a crayfish salt.

Dreweatts and Christie’s will jointly sell the Stanley Goldfein collection of ceramics across two sales this year.

Deceased estates and collectors selling up mean items collected in the late 20th century reappear at auction.

When Australian auction house Artvisory offers the Robert Burke collection on February 19-20 in Melbourne it will launch around 300 lots of prime 18th century English porcelain onto the market.

The Victoria and Albert Museum has bought the only known version of a vase produced by the Chelsea porcelain factory during its ‘Gold Anchor’ period.

Six 18th century Chelsea botanically decorated plates will feature in the sale to be held by Neue Auctions in Beachwood, Ohio on May 20.

Anthony du Boulay (1929-2022) was well known as an expert on Chinese ceramics, although his interests were more wide ranging.

The tills are ringing once more at Dreweatts (25% buyer’s premium). Under the ownership of the Gurr Johns group, the Newbury firm sold by Stanley Gibbons for £1.25m in 2017 has received a welcome shot in the arm.

Traditional collecting fields still have an attraction when estimates are realistic, as proved by 18th century porcelain and pottery auctioned in the US

Research shed light on the ‘Chelsea toys’ made by the mysterious ‘Girl on a Swing’ factory.

A Bamfords (20% buyer’s premium) sale included this 3¼in (34cm) tall Chelsea figure from the Red Anchor Senses set created by the Low Countries sculptor Joseph Willems (1710-66), in c.1755.

European ceramics from renowned US collector come to the New York rostrum.

These two teapots – among the top-selling lots at the Woolley & Wallis (25/12% buyer's premium) sale of English and European Ceramics and Glass on June 16 – came for sale from the family of Lady Kate Davson, known to many by her maiden name of Kate Foster (1938-2020).

This unmarked teapot and cover, offered by Dreweatts, dates from the first decade of porcelain production at the Chelsea factory.

Having postponed the sale in November and again in January, Chorley’s finally got to sell an exceptional private collection of early English porcelain in Prinknash Abbey, Gloucestershire, on March 24.