London

A grand piano commissioned by George IV in 1821 is to return to Brighton Pavilion after it sold for £62,000 at Piano Auctions (20% buyer’s premium) in London on April 6.

The March 29 sale by Bonhams (25/20/12% buyer’s premium) of books from the library at Glyn Cywarch featured many highlights.

From noble jewels to semi-precious gems, a show in May will celebrate a ‘golden period’ of Portuguese jewellery in the 18th century. Here we preview the exhibition and then present other recent and forthcoming sale highlights.

This Tiffany gold necklace and earclip suite composed of textured rose petal links by Angela Cummings (c.1944) sold for £10,200 at Bonhams Knightsbridge (25/20/12% buyer’s premium) on March 15.

The first of the biannual Antique Scientific Instrument Fairs due to be held on Sunday, April 30, at the Doubletree by Hilton Hotel in Bloomsbury, London, has been cancelled owing to unexpected refurbishment work at the hotel, advises Don Edwards, the organiser.

In the chapter titled ‘Modern Jewellery’ in her taste-making book, The Art of Beauty (1878), English writer Mary Eliza Haweis references the “artistic appreciation of good forms and good work” she found at Messrs Phillips of Cockspur Street.

The apparent decline in passing trade is a subject occupying the minds of many shop-owning dealers. But some, such as Brentford’s Hill House, have taken matters into their own hands by staging promotional events to encourage attendance.

A late 19th century/early 20th century ruby cameo and baroque pearl pendant once formed part of the celebrated jewellery collection assembled by Ganna Walska (1887-1984). It sold for a multi-estimate £55,000 at Sotheby’s (25/20/12% buyer’s premium) sale of fine jewels in Bond Street on March 22.

A textbook Renaissance style jewel by Carlo Giuliano (1831-95) led a strong jewellery offering at Thomas Watson (24% buyer’s premium) in Darlington on March 21.

The rivière – one of the most popular and enduring styles of necklace to come out of the Georgian period – features an endless line of matched or subtly graduated gems set within inconspicuous collets. However, as Marielle Whiting at Woolley & Wallis of Salisbury points out, seldom are they equals.

Waterhouse & Dodd’s upcoming exhibition focuses on the influence of David Bomberg’s (1890-1957) paintings on a wide circle of artists.

A former chairman of Christie’s South Kensington has written an open letter to owner François Pinault warning that his plans for the company could “gravely harm Christie’s in London”

A previously unknown complete set of Goya’s La Tauromaquia led Sotheby’s sale of Prints & Multiples in London on April 4.

With every one of the 531 lots sold, from an oak gateleg table that opened proceedings to a 1925 Douglas motorcycle, the March 29 Bonhams (25/20/15% buyer’s premium) sale of contents from Glyn Cywarch, a Welsh home of the Lords Harlech, was one of those ‘white-glove’ sales in which auction rooms take such pride.

A large, late work by JMW Turner appears at Sotheby’s on July 5 with an estimate of £15-25m.

Back for its 10th year, the annual Modern Movement Design Fair is held in a watery setting alongside the outdoor pool at the Grade II-listed Art Deco Brockell Lido in south London.