Lincolnshire

Schedule change for Lincolnshire Showground marks a shift in strategy but other organisers are more cautious.

It’s fair to say the work of Victorian animal painter Sidney Cooper (1803-1902) is not flavour of the month.

The idea to stage a 1940s weekend of events at Hemswell Antique Centres near Gainsborough in Lincolnshire in late July to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the RAF came from some of the dealers based there.

Art Deco bronze and ivory figures continue to do well – despite the imminent legislation that could render some of them illegal to sell.

Our weekly selection from salerooms and dealerships.

Echoes of Lincolnshire’s history in the hugely lucrative late medieval wool trade, this wool weight, below, probably from the 16th century, was the star item at John Taylors’ (18% buyer’s premium) appropriately named Wool Mart auction rooms in Louth.

Marvel comics in considerable numbers were a feature of a May 10 sale held by Golding Young & Mawer (20% buyer’s premium).

An 80-lot James Bond collection offeredin a recent Lincolnshire sale had been formed over a 40-year period.

Three 19th century porcelain figures from a Peoples of Russia series consigned to Lincoln auction house Golden Young & Mawer (20% buyer’s premium) by a local vendor attracted interest from the US to Russia.

A set of five Victorian diamond six-point star brooches sold for £26,000 at Golding Young & Mawer (20% buyer’s premium) on January 24. As each star has a hook fitting and a screw fitting for attachment, the set was probably once part of a suite consisting of frames for a tiara, necklace, earrings and brooches.

Evidence of the shrewd taste of student entertainments officers at Warwick University back in the Sixties came at Batemans’ (20% buyer’s premium) sale at Stamford in the form of two concert posters.

A pastel portrait of a fashionable young Georgian woman in an ostrich feather hat and blue coat with her dog topped the picture section at Lincolnshire saleroom Golding Young & Mawer (20% buyer’s premium).

“Buyers want to get back in action after the Christmas holiday,” said Darryl Kirk, saleroom manager at Unique Auctions (17.5% buyer’s premium), after 95% of the 1300 lots offered on New Year’s Day got away.

“We aim to be the largest bricks and mortar antiques centre in Europe with the largest website,” says Robert Miller, managing director of Hemswell Antique Centres.

As Springfield Fairs, Polly and Peter Trapmore-Shaw’s upcoming Spalding Antique and Collectors’ Fair in the Lincolnshire town famous for its flower bulbs, is at the Springfield Event Centre on Sunday, February 4.

The clearance of a neglected local property by Lincolnshire auction house Batemans (20% buyer’s premium) unearthed several treasures including two watercolours by the 18th century British painter Thomas Girtin (1775-1802).

A pair of watercolours depicting Berwick-upon-Tweed, the northern-most town in England, turned up at Batemans (20% buyer’s premium) on September 2.