Collectables

Special Auction Services is selling what it bills as ‘the largest and most valuable doll collection to been seen at auction for 25 years’.

A huge collection of black and white, celluloid negatives was described by the Lincoln auction house that offered them as a ‘magnificent, massive, eclectic mix of subjects’.

The appeal of more modern toys for the latest collectors buying based on nostalgia for childhood playthings was underlined by a large group of Transformers offered at Special Auction Services on January 17.

This 19th century glazed wooden case containing musket balls, ceramic fragments and three complete clay pipes was eagerly contested at auction.

A c.1964 publicity photograph signed by all four members of The Beatles sold for £13,000 at Bristol auction house Auctioneum (21% buyer’s premium).

Penny in the slot machines known as a ‘Working Model’ came in many guises but, essentially, they all formed a large upright cabinet with a glass window top section.

An original dust jacket made all the difference when Weiss Auctions (20% buyer’s premium) offered a first edition copy of Agatha Christie’s Dumb Witness in Lynbrook, New York.

As well as being an artist’s model and gallery owner who founded the museum dedicated to the work of the sculptor Aristide Maillol, Dina Vierny was also known as a collector of antique dolls.

London Transport commissioned publisher Edward Stanford to create the so-called ‘Bubble Map’ in 1934-35.

Auction offered near-complete example of the set that also formed a first pocket atlas of England and Wales

A sterling silver scale model of the Lockheed TriStar aircraft was the top lot at Kinghams’ (25% buyer’s premium) Silver and Objects of Vertu sale in the Cotswolds.

Dana Andrews, Peggy Cummins and Niall MacGinnis are not exactly household names these days but they starred in what is now regarded as one of the best horror films of the 1950s.

A tartan deck blanket, a pocket watch and a first-class dinner menu were all top-sellers in the latest auction of Titanic, White Star and Transport Memorabilia at Henry Aldridge & Son (plus 26.4% buyer’s premium).

The Doll & Bears Sale at Vectis (20.83% buyer’s premium) in Stockton-on-Tees included this rare Disney Donald Duck from the 1930s.

The toy company of Lines is often mentioned in relation to rocking horses but it was a double bay-fronted dolls’ house produced in c.1895 that impressed at Sheffield saleroom Ellis Willis & Beckett (19.5% buyer’s premium).

Dolls’ houses from the collection of a renowned expert and author came to auction in Kent.

The Late John Ruddle Collection of toy soldiers sale held at C&T (22% buyer’s premium) on December 6 was a very special occasion.

Estimated at $5000-10,000, a 14th century candlestick made during the classical period of Mamluk artistic production hammered for $100,000 (£79,500) at Leland Little (20% buyer’s premium) in Hillsborough, North Carolina, on December 1.

Our regular listing of books auctions