Kinghams

Appealing to a range of different types of collectors, particularly aficionados of sewing antiques, Victorian and Edwardian animal pin cushions have their own niche in the novelty silver field.

With the discovery of the intact tomb of Tutankhamun in 1923, an Egyptian revival swept through the decorative arts. Cartier and Van Cleef & Arpels were among the first to design jewels that mixed Egyptian motifs with the geometry and bold colours of the Art Deco era. But other French, British and US ateliers soon followed.

Pictures by eastern European artists generating interest from national-minded buyers is an increasingly common sight at UK regional sales.

Published in 1906 in a limited run of just 100 copies on paper and 20 on vellum was an edition of Sir Thomas More’s Utopia employing a red and black Subiaco typeface with red initials designed by Eric Gill.

Although catalogued by Smiths of Newent (20% buyer’s premium) as a chair from the early 19th century Empire period, this ebonised mahogany, gilt and polychrome side chair is more probably from the mid-Victorian period.

The recent release of 'The Electrical Life of Louis Wain' starring Benedict Cumberbatch provided a topical spin to this rare Amphora pottery model.

Christopher Dresser created a number of daring geometric designs for silver and silver-plated toast racks in the late 1870s and early 1880s, both for Hukin & Heath and for James Dixon & Son.

After the James Macintyre & Co factory was awarded a gold medal at the St Louis International Exhibition in 1904, Moorcroft pottery was sold in the US by a number of boutique retailers including Shreve & Co of San Francisco and Tiffany in New York.

Your starter for 10 – can you identify the artist of these still-lifes? Samuel Peploe, right?

The career course of Edith Robinson (1862-1929), a London art teacher and painter of chocolate box watercolours was changed in 1893 when she and her new husband, the Stamford artist Nelson Dawson (1859-1941) attended a series of lectures given by the enameller Alexander Fisher.

A small oil painting discovered among the contents of a Leamington Spa property sold for many multiples of its estimate at Kinghams (23% buyer’s premium).

One of the rarest of all of the 31 car mascots made by Lalique between 1925-31 came up for auction at Kinghams in the Cotswolds.

With their cross-over collecting appeal to the automobile market, Lalique 'bouchons de radiator' – car mascots or hood ornaments – assume their own price levels.

A new record for the Pilkington’s Lancastrian factory was set by Moreton-in-Marsh firm Kinghams.

Second sale since auction house move and name change is a British art pottery success

A week after Kinghams’ (23% buyer’s premium) inaugural Moreton-in-Marsh sale of British art pottery, the new Cotswolds rooms enjoyed a big hit in miniature – more specifically this portrait by one of Britain’s greatest miniaturists: John Smart (1743-1811).

Kingham & Orme’s (23% buyer’s premium) first-ever specialist auction of Jewellery & Watches took place on February 19 with just over 200 lots.