East Midlands

Three 19th century porcelain figures from a Peoples of Russia series consigned to Lincoln auction house Golden Young & Mawer (20% buyer’s premium) by a local vendor attracted interest from the US to Russia.

Antique pine furniture has many followers who buy it battered and cheap and simply ‘tart it up’ with an invariably low degree of skill and taste to sell on.

It is a year now since Jim Spencer joined Derbyshire saleroom Hansons (20% buyer’s premium), tasked with building up the book sections of their sales.

An iconographic gold ring – perhaps once belonging to a bishop or senior member of the clergy in the Yorkshire area – sold for £7100 at Hansons (20% buyer’s premium) in Etwall, Derbyshire.

Promoted as including the contents from a Derbyshire country home, the three-day pre-Christmas sale at Hansons (17.5% buyer’s premium) was more notable for two unusual collections and pieces which came in after a valuation day.

House enhanced by the great architect hosts fresh July fair which is already half booked by dealers wanting to stand.

A set of five Victorian diamond six-point star brooches sold for £26,000 at Golding Young & Mawer (20% buyer’s premium) on January 24. As each star has a hook fitting and a screw fitting for attachment, the set was probably once part of a suite consisting of frames for a tiara, necklace, earrings and brooches.

Evidence of the shrewd taste of student entertainments officers at Warwick University back in the Sixties came at Batemans’ (20% buyer’s premium) sale at Stamford in the form of two concert posters.

A pastel portrait of a fashionable young Georgian woman in an ostrich feather hat and blue coat with her dog topped the picture section at Lincolnshire saleroom Golding Young & Mawer (20% buyer’s premium).

“Buyers want to get back in action after the Christmas holiday,” said Darryl Kirk, saleroom manager at Unique Auctions (17.5% buyer’s premium), after 95% of the 1300 lots offered on New Year’s Day got away.

“We aim to be the largest bricks and mortar antiques centre in Europe with the largest website,” says Robert Miller, managing director of Hemswell Antique Centres.

As Springfield Fairs, Polly and Peter Trapmore-Shaw’s upcoming Spalding Antique and Collectors’ Fair in the Lincolnshire town famous for its flower bulbs, is at the Springfield Event Centre on Sunday, February 4.

Not only is industrious Derbyshire auction house Hansons about to launch its new saleroom down south, but it is also starting a new sale format building on the popular tribal art collecting scene.

IACF came up with some interesting leads this year and featured stories included Joe Mitchell, an event administrator for IACF who is an embroiderer, working for international costume designers.