Features

Partying through Prohibition, cocktail shakers sum up the spirit of Art Deco

It’s no surprise that prices of Art Deco bronze and ivory figures have fallen sharply since US and UK laws on the sale of elephant ivory were tightened.

The SS Normandie was both the apogee and the nadir of the Art Deco movement.

The Epstein family produced some of Britain’s leading examples of Art Deco furniture.

Femme à la Palme, c.1925, by Demetre Chiparus (1886-1947), the Romanian Art Deco sculptor, is an imposing example of his distinct style.

Jeroen Markies is a specialist in all things Art Deco, offering a range of furniture, sculpture, glass and lighting.

It is 20 years ago that the auction record for Clarice Cliff was sent tumbling when an 18in (46cm) May Avenue charger sold for £34,000 at Christie’s South Kensington on May 14, 2003. Those were heady days indeed.

Janice Kehoe of Solo Antiques specialises in Art Nouveau and Art Deco sculpture and glass as well as Arts & Crafts pieces.

Art Deco had a profound influence on all categories – not just art, sculpture or luxury furnishings but also on the design of more utilitarian items.

This is one of the very first batch of standard barographs produced by Richard Frères of Paris.

The Harrison semi-automatic pedestal knitting machine was designed c.1900 for producing rib socks.

The HMV 900 was one of first television receivers designed by the Marconi-EMI Television Company, the firm that also provided the technology for Britain’s first television service.

Induction coils used to produce high-voltage pulses from a low-voltage direct current, are often called Ruhmkorff coils although studied by Michael Faraday in the 1830s

A telephone exchange removed from Buckingham Palace during refurbishment 25 years ago sold in west London for £3000.

Like many scientists and eminent thinkers of the time, Isaac Newton was also a devout Christian who thought deeply about religious matters, as a manuscript sold at auction in New York reveals.

A lucernal microscope is a rare survivor.

This lacquered brass and mahogany Hawksbee-type double valve vacuum pump is signed to the recessed silvered plate Ladd, Penton Place, Walworth.

Interest in wireless telegraphy, that was piqued when Guglielmo Marconi successfully sent a message from Poldhu, Cornwall to St John’s, Newfoundland in 1910, prompted many amateurs to build and develop their own sets based on the ‘Coherer’ principle for sending and receiving Morse code.

The 40 trays of British butterflies in this handsome mahogany four-section cabinet by JJ Hill & Son of London were collected by Geoffrey Alfred Cole.

This brass cased mining aneroid pocket barometer altimeter, c.1885, was almost certainly a one-off order or commission.