Cotswold Auction Company

The market has certainly been challenging but recent results allied with metal prices give encouraging grounds for optimism

Pictured here are two lots of seat furniture that impressed bidders in recent auctions in Gloucestershire and Cheshire.

Limoges is regarded as one of the most important centres in the world for fine enamelware.

It is often said that the mark of a good illustrator is that their work is instantly recognisable.

Hugely decorative, impeccably provenanced and selling at an impressive sum, a pair of moulded relief panels were another of autumn’s Coade stone stars

Among the Modern British prints generating interest at auction this summer was a copy of Edward Bawden’s (1903-89) linocut 'The Road to Thaxted'.

A usually quiet August was dramatically awakened by a series of sleepers that emerged at three UK regional auction houses.

Recent advertising highlights from UK sales and an Italian auction

Furniture attributable to Gillows demonstrates demand for desirable pieces

A 1954 edition of 'The Mousetrap' play script offered on June 6 at the Cotswold Auction Company (24% buyer’s premium) was inscribed by the author “For James Grout on our 6th birthday, Agatha Christie”.

Punch and Judy shows in Britain date back to as early as 1662 – recorded by Pepys – with origins in the charismatic 16th century Italian puppet Pulcinella.

The Cotswold Auction Company (22% buyer’s premium) offered this version of the well-known Pilkington’s Lancastrian St George and the Dragon charger in Cheltenham.

According to family history, an Art Deco four-piece suite offered by Mander (20% buyer’s premium) in Sudbury on July 9 has an ocean-going history.

‘Significant damage and rust’ was spot on as a catalogue description when it came to an enamel sign sold at Cotswold Auction Company (22% buyer’s premium) on February 8. It was a mess.

Not all Contemporary art has to be either abstract or wacky.

These days, marketing a doll as Sindy’s saucy sister would be problematic. And the less said about outfits titled Hockey Honey or School Days, the better.

Portraits by James Sharples (1751-1811) appear to make less money than you might expect given the calibre of his sitters.

Two micro-mosaic pictures took a six-figure sum at a Cirencester saleroom – 10-times their low estimate.