Latest News Articles by Roland Arkell
Brounker Watts pocket watch up for grabs
24 April 2026The London watch and clock maker Brounker Watts (c.1670-1717), an apprentice to Joseph Knibb, became a member of the Clockmakers Company in 1697.
Kiwi pin cushion picked out as a rarity at Gloucestershire sale
24 April 2026Flightless bird walks away with a new owner as silver novelty rarities catch the eye at Kinghams
Anglo-Indian furniture in a good market place
24 April 2026Though sourced separately, the two best-selling furniture lots at Gorringe’s (25% buyer’s premium) latest Fine Art & Interiors sale in Lewes were both products of colonial India.
Kangxi wall sconces bid over five times estimate
24 April 2026An auction titled China 500 Years held by Mayfair orientalist firm Plakas (29% buyer’s premium) on March 19 included elements of two rare Kangxi (1662-1722) blue and white porcelain wall sconces. They were estimated at £2000-3000 but contested to £17,000.
Huge Flambé Landscape vase sets new record for any piece of Moorcroft pottery
21 April 2026The quarter-century old auction record for Moorcroft pottery has been broken with the sale of a massive Flambé Landscape pattern vase for £32,000.
Turning the tables on Victorian furniture: Trollope's exhibition quality example takes five-figure sum
17 April 2026Quality and craftsmanship is rarely out of fashion.
Florence Nightingale opines on the first Geneva Convention
17 April 2026A letter written by Florence Nightingale in which she discusses the creation of the Red Cross and the Geneva Convention is being sold by Sworders.
Pick of the week: A barnstorming tale of murder most foul attracts bidders at Essex auction
17 April 2026The Red Barn Murder of 1827, which occurred in the tiny rural village of Polstead, Suffolk was the biggest crime story of the era.
Iznik pottery from two pioneer British collections returns to auction
17 April 2026Produced in Ottoman Turkey between the 15th and 17th centuries, Iznik pottery experienced a sudden and passionate surge of Western interest in the mid 19th century.
Furniture and snuffbox benefit from a bit of regal assistance
17 April 2026A Queen Anne olivewood oyster, holly and walnut cabinet on stand offered by Dreweatts (27/26% buyer’s premium) in Newbury was among a number of lots sold recently showing the commercial boost that royal provenance can provide.
New French museum buys 17th century scientific instruments at auction
15 April 2026A new museum currently under construction just outside Paris has made two purchases at Hôtel Drouot this month.
Item revealed to be not a stool but a headrest puts in a spirited performance at auction
10 April 2026Kali shaped from local hardwoods, typically ironwood, were traditionally made by canoe-builders in the South Sea islands.
Pocket globes put the world to rights
10 April 2026Two of London’s salerooms sold Georgian pocket globes on March 12. Both hammered well above what proved modest estimates.
Second watch said to have been found on body of Titanic victim John Jacob Astor emerges at auction
10 April 2026Two years after a Wiltshire auction house set a record for Titanic memorabilia with “the watch recovered from the body of John Jacob Astor”, another timekeeper making precisely the same claim is coming to market.
Alice in slumberland: bed once belonging to Alice Liddell comes to auction
10 April 2026Alice Liddell was just a 10-year-old living in Oxford in the 1860s when Charles Dodgson – better known by his pen name Lewis Carroll – spun a fantastical tale to her and her two sisters Edith and Lorina on a summer afternoon by the Thames.
Pick of the week: Mickey and Minnie get on their bike to a German auction
10 April 2026The Mickey and Minnie Mouse motorcycle made by Tippco, c.1932, is the most desirable of all the German tinplate clockwork toys from the immediate pre-war period.
Rediscovered portraits by Romney and Raeburn emerge at auctions this spring
10 April 2026Mark the diary for the appearance of two notable British portraits at auction in Paris and in Cambridge.
Corkscrews and much more in a town surrounded by vineyards
10 April 2026An interview with antiques dealer Jeremy Astfalck of The Old Corkscrew, Franschhoek