UK

This 18th century needlework panel appears to be a fragment of a work conceived on almost Bayeux Tapestry proportions.

Some of the heat may have left the Jack Vettriano (b.1951) market since his Singing Butler made £660,000 in April 2004, but Sotheby’s nevertheless posted the second highest price ever paid for the artist at auction when they sold Bluebird at Bonneville for £400,000 (plus premium) – the top lot of the firm’s annual sale at the Gleneagles Hotel in Perthshire on the evening of August 29.

ELTHAM Palace in Greenwich is fully booked on Sunday, September 9 for its regular biannual Art Deco Fair with 15 specialist Deco dealers, including the Design Gallery of Westerham.

Leyburn auctioneers Tennants have standardised their buyer’s premium rates across their sales.

A substantial reward is being offered for the return of a George III ormolu and white marble table clock by Matthew Boulton stolen from Knightsbridge dealership Hotspur on the afternoon of Wednesday, August 22.

Kent’s Canterbury Auction Galleries were one of the few salerooms to hold a good quality art and antiques sale in August.

As of September 1, the Penkridge Salerooms come under new ownership.

The Frieze art fair (October 11-14) at Regents Park has already spawned two ‘tailgate’ events in the form of Scope and Zoo, but this year’s new addition is a little different.

JS Auctions are having to cease operations at their Cotefield Farm premises in Bodicote near Banbury.

West Sussex auctioneers Worthing Auction Galleries and Scarborough Fine Art are to merge.

A two-week exhibition of contemporary furniture featuring the work of some of the north of England’s top makers and designers is to be held at The Auction Centre in Leyburn, North Yorkshire, from August 21-31.

LOUISE Walker, who has been organising antiques fairs in Harrogate for the past 27 years, will launch a contemporary art fair in the North Yorkshire town next Easter.

THE antiques and collectors fairs at Alexandra Palace will not be returning following a breaking off in negotiations between the organisers and the venue’s new owners.

Bonhams have announced a major strengthening and enlargement of the ceramics department at their New Bond Street rooms with the immediate appointment of two former Sotheby’s specialists.

It was catalogued as Bow c.1760 but this English porcelain coffee cup seen at Bamfords of Derby on July 25 was identified as belonging to a much rarer class of porcelain associated with Charles Gouyn and a short-lived London concern in St James’s.

This unusual 18th century bookstand or tray top commode, measuring 2ft 4in (71cm) wide, made a multiple-estimate £20,000 (plus 17.5 per cent buyer’s premium) at Dukes of Dorchester on July 26.

Majority of auctioneers and dealers breath sigh of relief, but other were not so fortunate.

Soon after marrying his young wife Jane, William Morris commissioned his friend Philip Webb to build them a house. The end result, completed in 1859, was Red House, named after its steep red-tiled roof.

High drama at the Chichester auction rooms of Henry Adams on July 19 when this pair of Chinese famille rose moon flasks shot to £760,000. The price, a house record, is also the fourth highest ever achieved in a UK auction room outside of London.

DESPITE the odd flooded cellar and car park, ATG are not aware of a single UK auctioneer in affected areas who will not be going ahead with their sales in the coming week.