Auction Reports

Despite having no maker’s mark, the design and quality of this c.1930 oak reclining book table armchair, below, proclaimed Ambrose Heal.

Dunhill Aquarium table lighters painted by Margaret Bennett and husband Alan in the 1950s-60s remain popular among collectors in these non-smoking days.

Rated a museum-quality piece, this rare c.1902 spirit-fired Märklin fire engine led the field at toys specialist Wallis & Wallis (24% buyer’s premium).

In a sale that yielded quality and surprises in most sections, the major talking points at Stride & Son (18% buyer’s premium) were provided by two pieces of furniture. Emerging from the same house and given here-to-sell estimates, both achieved five-figure results.

A cigarette box engraved with the facsimile signature Captain Falcon Scott may have been a piece the Antarctic hero gave to a fellow explorer he offended.

This silver teapot has London hallmarks for 1792 and a maker’s mark for silversmith Michael Plummer who worked out of Gutter Lane, London, from 1791-95.

With all 80 lots getting away – 79 to a single UK collector – a group of walking sticks totalled more than £40,000 at Charterhouse (25% buyer’s premium).

A manuscript volume sold for £4200 was the main attraction of a sale held by Crow’s (22% buyer’s premium) of Dorking.

Until its sale last year, Newbold Pacey Hall had been the seat of the Little family since the house was built by William Little in c.1780-90.

A recent sale at Cotswold Auction Company (22% buyer’s premium) included a single-owner collection of antiquities from Lionel Walrond (1927-2020).

On a day when furniture and antiques proved to be particularly popular, the surprise star of Fellows’ (23% buyer’s premium) 740-lot online sale was an Italian 19th century pier mirror.

This Liverpool creamware transfer-printed frog mug was produced by the short-lived Herculaneum factory c.1830-33 just after the 1829 Rainhill Steam Trials.

Although now known as Gainsborough chairs, generous walnut and upholstered armchairs were often referred to by contemporaries as ‘French’ chairs, as the most elaborate styles were based on French rococo.

Two pieces of sculpture – both catalogued as 19th century copies – made much higher than expected prices in the UK regions last month.

Georg Siegmund Stobwasser (1717-76) and his son Johann Heinrich (1740-1829) were among many craftsmen who moved to Brunswick during the Seven Years’ War.

Colchester auction house Reeman Dansie follows a policy of detailed cataloguing for Chinese art but modest estimates

A recent Reeman Dansie sale in Colchester included 80 pieces from the estate of the well-known dealer Jane Sumner, who died last September at the age of 82.

Although catalogued as ‘a 19th century Japanese woodblock print’, the signature to a scene of a boat with Mount Fuji beyond gave a clue to its creator.

Two of the choice pieces of furniture in Bonhams’ Oak Interiors sale on January 20-21 were published examples.

Despite lockdown restrictions Bonhams' traditional Oak Interior offerings performed very well