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A very rare panorama of 17th century London depicting the city skyline in the wake of the Great Fire of 1666 has sold at auction for £90,000.

Duke’s of Dorchester has announced what promises to be the biggest house contents sale of the year and the largest by a UK regional auction house for more than a decade.

A fine pair of Regency dwarf bookcases in the manner of George Oakley sold for £58,000 at the Martel Maides saleroom in St Peter Port, Guernsey.

It was a case of best feet forward at Stroud Auctions (18% buyer’s premium) when a pair of Georgian ladies’ embroidered shoes with cut steel buckles and leather soles was offered.

The May 11-12 Geneva sale conducted by Phillips in association with watch consultancy Bacs & Russo includes one of the most complicated wristwatches of the pre-war era: the Vacheron Constantin minute repeater with retrograde calendar from 1940.

A round-up of art and antiques news from the previous seven days, including news of the Louvre Museum in Paris buying Eugène Delacroix's (1798-1863) sketchbooks featuring views of London.

Running to 50 volumes in all, the official report on 'The Scientific Results of the Voyage of HMS Challenger during the years 1873-76 in Atlantic, Pacific and Antarctic seas' took some 23 years to complete.

In an age of cumbersome large photographical apparatus, the race was on in the mid-19th century to produce practical small, easily portable cameras.

A look at the latest photograph auction highlights, potential sale stars to come, fairs coming up and a camera and equipment spotlight.

In terms of name recognition in the UK, Alvar Aalto is probably outranked by the American couple Charles Eames (1907-78) and his wife Ray (1912-88). Of their output the lounge chair (670) and ottoman (671) designed in 1956 is the most iconic.

Now a regular fixture for a number of auction houses, specialist Modern Design sales have moved a long way since the days when the title could mean mountains of Moorcroft and Clarice Cliff and not a lot more.

Devoted wholly to modern firsts, a recent online sale presented the first selection of a single-owner collection – the second portion of which will be sold later in the year.

An incomplete set of that remarkable ornithological work, William Lewin’s 'Birds of Great Britain', was the most expensive lot in a recent Yorkshire sale.