Auctioneers

The 18th and 19th centuries were the golden age of topaz.

The watch-makers in the Vallée de Joux in Switzerland were a textbook 19th century cottage industry – typically self-employed men, and some women, working either in the ateliers based in the hamlet of Crêt-Meylan or at home. Seldom did they receive credit for their great skill.

Cathedrals, palaces and abbeys were also among the sights featured as British tourism developed

Cardiff auction indicates latest demand trends influencing the market for leading Welsh painter Sir Kyffin Williams

The group of Chinese ‘export’ silver offered by Gorringe’s (25% buyer’s premium) in Lewes on April 21 came by descent from Reginald Follett Codrington Hedgeland (1874-1967), an Oxford graduate from Exeter who joined the Chinese Maritime Customs Service in 1898.

Letters of the Late Ignatius Sancho, an African, tells the remarkable story of an African born on a British slave ship who earned a place among the London elite.

An item of great interest for me was the small pocket knife that was recently sold together with its own story from the Titanic disaster* [see Previews, ATG No 2739].

A pair of Edwardian wine and water ewers by London silversmith Sydney Bellamy Harman, 1910, tied for the most-expensive lot at a recent Doyle (28% buyer’s premium) auction.

Two years after a Wiltshire auction house set a record for Titanic memorabilia with ‘the watch recovered from the body of John Jacob Astor’ at £900,000, another timekeeper making precisely the same claim has sold in Chicago for $800,000 (£592,000).

The latest Design Since 1860 sale at Lyon & Turnbull in Edinburgh was topped by four Morris & Co tile panels depicting the Labours of the Months dated to c.1865.

The first Australian sporting team to tour internationally included players Johnny Mullagh (traditional name Unaarrimin), Harry Bullocky (Bullchanach), Dick-a-Dick (Jungunjinanuke), Johnny Cuzens (Zellanach) and Twopenny (Murrumgunarriman).

As a dealer, collector and enthusiast of ethnographic art, Gordon Reece spent a lifetime travelling the globe in search of artefacts.

As vintage wristwatches continue to dominate the watch market, finding interesting examples at reasonable prices has become a challenge. However, opportunities are out there

Among the most intriguing naïve pictures sold recently was a simple and ostensibly unassuming painting of a ship offered at a recent Dominic Winter (22% buyer’s premium) auction.

Railtons [auction house] received this heavy and rather grubby Victorian marble bust just as our end of March catalogue was going to press.