Auction Reports

Collected by a Scottish enthusiast, 26 railway station totems – the enamel signs introduced across the UK by newly nationalised British Rail in 1948 – gained UK-wide interest at McTear’s (24% buyer’s premium) in Glasgow.

Nestlé, today a Swiss multinational corporation, was a much smaller company when this rare lithographed showcard was made.

Pictured here are three good examples of Worcester hard-paste porcelain from the early decades of the 19th century – at which time there was a trio of factories operating in the city.

Pair thought to be Derby are rated as Gilbody rarities by specialist and dealer who competed

Delayed for a month by the pandemic, the specialist sewing sale held as a timed online auction on thesaleroom.com at Bleasdales (20% buyer’s premium) of Warwick proved a profitable stitch in time. The sale, which covered the gamut of collectables, closed with only 16 of the 665 lots failing to get away.

Although a smaller affair than the much better-known Isle of Wight festival of the same year, the Bath Festival of Blues and Progressive Music, held on June 27-28, 1970, at the Shepton Mallet showground, boasted perhaps the greatest UK music festival line-up of all time.

The recent Mallams (22.5% buyer’s premium) live online sale of Chinese, Japanese and Islamic art in Cheltenham included Chinese works on paper and textiles from a relative of Katherine Talati (1922-2015).

Two 19th century ‘prestige’ knives from southern Africa attracted unexpected levels of bidding at Grand Auctions (20% buyer’s premium) in Folkestone. Estimated at just £40-80 each, they made a combined £9200.

The artist John Hurford was a key figure in the British psychedelia movement of the late 1960s.

It was during the so-called Transitional period, the era of protracted civil war that marked the transition from Ming to Qing, that the centuries-old system of court-sponsored porcelain manufacture at Jingdezhen collapsed.

The response among Sixties regulars at a north London pub to the fly poster, below, advertising a gig by the High Numbers may well have been: The who?

Estimated at £150-200, this Georgian dial clock stormed to £4800 at Charterhouse (25% buyer’s premium) in Sherborne. Two collectors made much of the bidding.

The maxim that major names and top quality will always sell was underlined in the biannual specialist clocks sale at Dreweatts (25% buyer’s premium).

Despite – or because of – the imminent prohibition, good-quality antique ivory works of art continue to bring solid prices at auction.

This late Victorian silver-gilt and enamel ‘freedom casket’ sold at Ibbett Mosely (15% buyer’s premium) of Sevenoaks carries the name of John Aynsley II (1823-1907) and was awarded following his tenure as mayor of Longton from 1886-90.

Pictured here is one of two 19th century or earlier Maori greenstone 'mere' offered at a recent sale held by Reeman Dansie (20% buyer’s premium) in Colchester.

From the house clearance of a deceased estate, a small collection of Arts & Crafts metalwork triggered an estimate-demolishing response from dealers and collectors at Fieldings (20% buyer’s premium).

This large 16in (40cm) high baluster faience vase, sold by Hansons (25% buyer’s premium) in Teddington, is by ‘father of art pottery movement’ Joseph-Théodore Deck (1823-91).

Not to be confused with the modern reissues, the original Vulcain Cricket was marketed in 1947 as the world’s first wristwatch with an alarm.

Topping the Mid-Century Design sale held by Sworders (25% buyer’s premium) in Stansted Mountfitchet, Essex, was a trademark work by Peter Collingwood (1922-2008) – the British craftsman at the forefront of weaving for 50 years.