Pick of the Week

The commercial fortunes of a 19th century map of the Arctic offered at Cheffins (25% buyer’s premium) this month were boosted greatly by its annotations.

The gift of the private collection of the late George Withers keeps on giving.

A pair of 19th century Parisian novelty silhouette hand screens, made by François Simon Alphonse Giroux, doubled their estimate at auction.

A shirt from the first time the famed All Blacks played in white instead has sold at auction.

It is a good time to be selling works by Thomas Daniell (1749-1840).

Rediscovered books and manuscripts that once belonged to former antiquarian book dealer John Percival Love and had been stored away in a bank vault for nearly 50 years captivated collectors and the trade alike at auction.

With clients including the Maharajah of Kutch, Queen Victoria and multiple princes and dukes, Holmes & Co was one of the top coachbuilders of the 19th century.

A set of six George III giltwood side chairs made by Thomas Chippendale for Brocket Hall, Hertfordshire sold at Dreweatts on January 31.

A somewhat innocuous-looking lot at Hansons (26% buyer’s premium) proved to be anything but as a number of eagle-eyed bidders spotted a significant discovery contained therein.

A rare portrait of the magician Chevalier Joseph Pinetti (1750-1800) emerged for sale in Asheville, North Carolina.

Estimated at £3000-5000, an album containing possibly unique views in the Treaty Port of Chinkiang (Zhenjiang) sold for £8200 (plus 25% buyer’s premium) at the Flints auction on January 9.

The vast majority of Georgian-era Channel Islands silver baluster mugs are of a pint or half-pint capacity.

The Christmas Gifts sale at TW Gaze in Diss included a rare example of 18th century Catholic colonial jewellery: a Mexican 'escudo de monja' or nun’s badge.

It was around 1860 that the trained artist François Willème (1830-1905) began to experiment with photography as a way to create sculpture.

An album of watercolour studies of Ottoman ceramics that connects two of the British collectors of the early 20th century raced away from its estimate at Dominic Winter in Gloucestershire.

The writing was on the wall for the Waverley not long after it entered the market in 1895.