Sworders

Cellars and attics at famous Norfolk estate are cleared out as part of ‘housework’ to allow guided tours

Chanel No 5 was perfected in the late summer and autumn of 1920 by the French-Russian chemist and perfumer Ernest Beaux.

A Roman marble portrait bust of an Antonine prince emerged Sworders’ (25% buyer’s premium) sale in Stansted Mountfitchet.

The auction market can be a fickle beast, as results for the same items offered on separate occasions sometimes show.

A pair of neoclassical mahogany and ormolu demilune pier tables, believed to be John Hobbs-Buggins fakes, have sold for a tiny fraction of their original retail price.

A cross-section of the work of Terence Cuneo (1907-96) featured as part of Sworders’ latest sale of Modern and Contemporary Art in Stansted Mountfitchet.

Modern British painter depicted local life in west London including pub interiors and characters

Maps and documents relating to Quaker family come up at Essex auction house centuries later

Moorcroft pottery collection offered in Essex saleroom had a great focus on signed wares of the initial Macintyre era when the designer was at his prime

A look at unusual lots that stood out in recent auctions

A single-owner collection of 37 pieces of Louis Vuitton luggage formed part of Sworders’ (25% buyer’s premium) Design sale.

More than a dozen letters and cards from Diana, Princess of Wales, to her family’s former housekeeper were sold at a recent auction at Sworders (25% buyer’s premium).

Agnete Hoy (1914-2000) brought her own distinctive style to the ailing Doulton Lambeth factory, reviving the traditional decorative methods of earlier artists to make contemporary stonewares from 1952 until the studio closed in 1957.

Highlights from the estate of Max Clendinning and Ralph Adron sold at Sworders

Born in Constantinople, the daughter of a French nobleman of Hungarian descent, painter Sophie-Ernestine de Tott (1758-1848) spent more than two decades in London as an amateur painter and musician.