UK

THAMES Valley Police urgently want to trace the man pictured right, in connection with a serious offence in Oxfordshire.

HOME Counties organisers Jill Napper and Joy O’Meara, who operate as Jay Fairs, have just acquired the long-established Benson Antiques & Collectors Fair, held in the Parish Hall at Benson, Oxfordshire. They will run the fair from September 19 and on the third Sunday of each month thereafter. It will be AA signposted.

SIX masked raiders broke into the South Cotswolds Antiques Fair at Westonbirt School, near Tetbury in Gloucestershire around 3am on the morning of Sunday August 15 and escaped with an estimated £400,000 worth of jewellery.

THE most expensive single football programme in a June 20-21 sale held by Knights was a 1921 FA Cup Final programme, right, for the game at Stamford Bridge in which Spurs beat Wolves 1-0. It sold for £2400.

TWO Dulwich ladies have successfully tapped into the trend towards 20th century design and on Sunday September 19 hold their third Midcentury Modern event at the 1960s Christisson-designed refectory at the famous local public school Dulwich College, on Dulwich Common, London SE21.

WITH rising interest rates, a fluctuating stock market, selective bidding and increasing competition for quality private consignments, now may not be thought to be the most prudent time for expansion but Wotton Auction Rooms (15% buyer's premium) have gone ahead with plans to build a larger saleroom within their existing premises. It will open next month.

ENGLISH Test victories aside, the cricket highlight of the summer was a sale held by Knights at the Holiday Inn, Sandy (Beds) on June 19, which offered over 900 lots of cricket memorabilia.

A COPY of the Lawn Tennis Annual for 1882, compiled by L.S.F. Winslow, made £650 in a June 16-17 sale held in Ludlow by Mullock Madeley.

THERE are local buyers aplenty for Cornish fare such as Newlyn copper and Troika pottery, but for the lion’s share of their sales Lays (15% buyer's premium) depend on a broader geographical spread of dealers and collectors whose participation tends to peter out during the height of the tourist season.

THE controversy over whether fox hunting should be banned may rumble on, but, presumably, even the most committed hunt saboteur could not take exception to this intriguing Victorian fantasy painting.

IT is sad to report that the Classics Bookshop in Turl Street, Oxford is soon to close due, I understand, to increases in rent required by Lincoln College. I am told that many shops in the Turl are affected.

A LOT from the Michael Wittock collection of important Renaissance bindings sold by Christie’s on July 7, this is one of the two vols. that make up an exceptional copy of the 1540, first Aldine edition of the works of Machiavelli and was one of a large number of books bound in Venice in 1547 for Antoine Perrenot de Granvelle, the humanist Bishop of Arras, by a craftsman who came to be known as the Fugger Binder after one of his later patrons.

MEANWHILE, that well-known and popular organiser Reg Cooper, who knows as much about the vicissitudes of the business as most, is returning confidently to the fray with a new venture.

WITH a turnover last year in excess of £5 million, Vectis, who are based in Stockton-on-Tees, are well known as the world’s largest auctioneers of toys. Perhaps less well known is the fact that the company also organise shows and, for some years, have put together the successful London Toy Soldier Show at The Royal National Hotel in London’s Bloomsbury.

ONCE owned by a member of Henri III’s ‘Compagnie des Confrères de la Mort’, this psalmbook, right, a 1586 Parisian edition of Le pseaultier de David..., is bound in French sombre morocco.

IN Louis Taylor's (12.5% buyer's premium) 700-lot General and Victoriana Hanley outing on July 12, it was the small collectable entries that generated some of the top prices with a Beswick Lipizaner horse and rider fetching £245, despite extensive damage, and a silver cigar box commemorating Winston Churchill selling at £240.

VINTAGE vehicles are generally the province of specialist auctions, but Tennants (15/10% buyer's premium) finished their July 22-23 sale with a number of such offerings, in particular this 1910 Star 15mph tourer, right.

DEFINITELY in the running for the accolade of busiest organiser is Harrogate-based Galloway Antiques Fairs who make one of their many annual forays North of the Border from September 10 to 12 for the Blair Castle Antiques Fair at Blair Atholl near Pitlochry in Perthshire.

WEST Kent dealers Julian and Candy Lovegrove of Rose and Crown Antiques at West Malling, are also expanding and hope to pick up business in East Kent.

FOLLOWING the success of last year’s inaugural reunion of former Phillips employees there will be a similar Phillips Reunited gathering next month on Tuesday September 14 at 6.30pm.