“It was a genuine mix of bits and pieces,” said Berkshire auctioneer Mark Law of the mahogany furniture, garden statuary, period light fittings, paintings, jewellery, silver and samplers from the house which accounted for 70 per cent of the lots on offer.
Estimates reflected their mixed condition ranging from £30 up to £6000. However, a sign of the times, as well as the holiday season, was the absence of widespread trade interest.
Happily for the vendors, local private interest was such that 78 per cent of the lots found buyers sufficiently well-heeled to result in a £210,000 total.
The star turn was a case in point – a George III mahogany bureau bookcase. Standing 7ft 4in high by 3ft 6in wide (2.24 x 1.06m), it had two astragal glazed doors above a base with pigeonholes, chequer-strung small drawers and a central door with marquetry flowers and four long graduated drawers. Although there was no trade interest, the ready-to-go bookcase was contested to £7200 by private collectors.
It wasn’t all plain sailing and there were some casualties among the higher-priced furniture. For instance, only one of the two mahogany
dining tables on offer got away. This was a George III table with reeded edge and drop-leaf centre section with two D-shaped ends on square tapering legs, 4ft 6in by 10ft (1.35m x 3m). It had originally graced Southington’s dining room and sold to a dealer at £4000.
However, while this was fresh on the market, the William IV table, 4ft by 7ft 5in (1.2m x 2.23m), was not. Consigned by a family member who had bought it from the trade within the last ten years, it remained unsold at £4000-6000.
Buyers were also selective when it came to seating furniture. While a large pair of 19th century mahogany armchairs in early George III style brought £2200, no buyers were found for a set of ten Hepplewhite-style mahogany dining chairs at £2500-3500.
Southington’s new owners had to fight with specialist trade buyers for the gilt metal light fittings. Many went above estimate including a set of four gilt metal two-branch wall lights hung with faceted drops and fitted for electricity.
These brought £1050 while a pair of 19th century gilt metal five-branch wall lights in 18th century French style cast with scrolling leaves, went at £720. Southington’s previous owners – the Portal family – were also keen to buy back entries and battled with the trade for works relating to the family’s history including a glass tapering sided flask with plated hinged cover. Inscribed Served in Crimea with Robert Portal, Capt. 4th Light Dragoons, 1854-55, and
B. Portal. 17th Lancers... 1888, it came with an additional silver beaker.
Robert Portal had famously survived the Crimean War’s Charge of the Light Brigade and this flask was secured by the family at £350 against a £50-80 estimate. The family also secured a Victorian silver round waiter with an armorial, London, 1898, inscribed Presented to Capt. Portal, 17th Lancers, on his marriage, April 12th 1899, from the servants at Malshanger. It sold at £380.
American and English trade battled for a large Kings pattern silver service, London, 1820, by William Chawner. An American on the phone was triumphant, taking all seven lots into which the service was split at a combined total of £3800. Another tempting entry was a 19th century white marble life size figure of Eve, indistinctly signed and dated 1881, that coaxed a £5200 winning bid from a dealer despite a broken and restored hand.
One of the most striking consignments from a different vendor was a 19th century beech life sized lay figure with brass mounts, 5ft 10in (1.78m). Marked with inked numbers, it sold above estimate to the trade at £5000.
Law Fine Art, Brimpton, July 9
Number of lots offered: 691
Number of lots sold: 536
Sale total: £210,000
Buyer’s premium: 15 per cent
Local interest fills the trade gap at country house success
THE Law Fine Art sale at Southington House, a country house near Overton, Hampshire, had everything you might expect to find in a home lived in by one family for over a century.
