UK

Duke’s of Dorchester has announced what promises to be the biggest house contents sale of the year and the largest by a UK regional auction house for more than a decade.

A fine pair of Regency dwarf bookcases in the manner of George Oakley sold for £58,000 at the Martel Maides saleroom in St Peter Port, Guernsey.

It was a case of best feet forward at Stroud Auctions (18% buyer’s premium) when a pair of Georgian ladies’ embroidered shoes with cut steel buckles and leather soles was offered.

Arthur Swallow Fairs’ Antiques & Home show may not have the moniker ‘international’ attached but the event attracts a strong overseas group of buyers who comb the fair, clutching sheets of shipping firm stickers to identify purchases for collection.

Running to 50 volumes in all, the official report on 'The Scientific Results of the Voyage of HMS Challenger during the years 1873-76 in Atlantic, Pacific and Antarctic seas' took some 23 years to complete.

Throughout May, Antiques On High in Oxford will have a window display to support a new book by local author and ex-dealer Sylvia Vetta.

In an age of cumbersome large photographical apparatus, the race was on in the mid-19th century to produce practical small, easily portable cameras.

In terms of name recognition in the UK, Alvar Aalto is probably outranked by the American couple Charles Eames (1907-78) and his wife Ray (1912-88). Of their output the lounge chair (670) and ottoman (671) designed in 1956 is the most iconic.

Now a regular fixture for a number of auction houses, specialist Modern Design sales have moved a long way since the days when the title could mean mountains of Moorcroft and Clarice Cliff and not a lot more.

Devoted wholly to modern firsts, a recent online sale presented the first selection of a single-owner collection – the second portion of which will be sold later in the year.

An incomplete set of that remarkable ornithological work, William Lewin’s 'Birds of Great Britain', was the most expensive lot in a recent Yorkshire sale.

Special Auction Services regularly holds sales of photographic equipment cameras and photographs in its Newbury rooms.

Photographica 2019 is a destination for collectors of classic cameras. The fair hosts up to 135 tables for buying, selling and swapping classic and antique cameras from across the country.

The ‘Big Red’ Daytona reference 6265 is one of the most desirable Rolex chronographs from the 1980s.

With a documented provenance and inscribed by the maker Sébastien Garnier, Paris, 1747, a two-manual harpsichord was the top performer at the latest musical instruments sale held by Corsham, Bath, specialist Gardiner Houlgate (20% buyer’s premium).

Flemish Old Masters and Modern works combined to boost takings at two spring sales held north and south in England.

Universal Genève helped change the horological landscape in 1934 with the introduction of an affordable two-button Compur chronograph – a line that continued into the 1940s.

Lyon & Turnbull’s (25% buyer’s premium) inaugural Modern Made auction at the Mall Galleries in London received plenty of encouraging noises from the dealing and collecting community as it posted a total of £1m (including premium).