UK

MANY people are content to put together one major collection in their lifetime. To assemble one, disperse it at a major saleroom, set about doing the same thing all over again and then hold a second auction within the space of just over a decade takes some doing.

THE Staffordshire Hoard has been saved for the nation – and a further £1.7m appeal has been launched to pay for its conservation, study and display.

A SPECIALIST conservation event will take place at the Royal Asiatic Society on April 13.

THE Portobello Road antiques trade have suffered another blow after the shutters finally came down on a long-established Saturday market. The early morning Good Fairy Market closed in the first week of March with no indication given that it will reopen as an antiques market.

THE escalating popularity of post-War Northern artists was proved twice last week as auction records for both Helen Bradley and William Turner were set at Bonhams.

FOLLOWING the confidential settlement made between The Andrew Lloyd Webber Art Foundation and the heirs of Paul von Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, Picasso’s 1903 portrait of his friend Angel Fernandez de Soto will be offered for sale at Christie’s in London on June 23 with an estimate of £30-40m.

WILTSHIRE auctioneers Netherhampton Salerooms were celebrating a new house record on March 3 after a disbound album of Far Eastern topographical drawings sold for £43,000.

THE home of West Midlands toy specialists Astons is the grade II listed Baylies's Charity School, on Tower Street, Dudley.

THE National Association of Valuers and Auctioneers (NAVA) will hold its annual Forum for chattels auctioneers and valuers at The Belfry golf and leisure resort in the West Midlands on April 26.

ONE of the North East’s best-known auctioneers faces a substantial fine and a possible prison sentence after being charged over the sale of an Edwardian collection of birds’ eggs.

INTERNATIONAL Antiques and Collectors’ Fairs (IACF), the owners of the Newark and Ardingly showground events, have announced plans to hold a regular one-day fair at the RAF Swinderby site.

Bearnes, Hampton & Littlewood (BHL) are not seeking to recover a cache of gold and jewellery accidentally sold as part of a lot in their 2006 sale of Agatha Christie effects.

DRAMATICALLY overshooting a £2000-3000 estimate, this small unsigned Mannerist oil on slate depicting Venus and Cupid attracted the attention of at least ten bidders at Rosebery's of West Norwood, South London on March 9.

EWBANK Clarke Gammon Wellers of Surrey have extended their influence south west by forming a strategic alliance with Bournemouth auction house Riddetts.

BEARNES Hampton & Littlewood have held their first sale at the newly renovated Dowell Street, Honiton saleroom which they took over from Bonhams' in January.

OF all the many subjects painted by Harry Davis during his long tenure at the Royal Worcester factory, among the rarest and most desirable are polar bears in an Arctic landscape.

THE public protest over the replacement of antiques shops in Portobello by fashion stores and other chains is gathering pace.

THE 1953 FA Cup Final will forever be known as the Matthews Final.It was while playing for Blackpool against Bolton Wanderers that the legendary winger Sir Stanley Matthews (1915-2000) gave his career-defining performance and won the only major honour of a long career.

B2B Events have won a three-year contract to run four or five antiques and collectors’ fairs annually at the Detling showground.

SEVERE weather conditions have badly damaged the marquee which Antique Forum use for their six annual weekend fairs held at Trentham Gardens, near Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire.