North-west England

A rare rocking horse by one of the top 19th-early 20th century makers, FH Ayres of London, left quite a lot to be desired but raced away at Adam Partridge’s (15% buyer’s premium) Macclesfield sale on November 23.

It has been a busy month for Broadhursts Bookshop owner Laurie Hardman.

What year was the Chester Golf Club established? This 19th century silver snuff box on offer for £565 from Acorn Antiques at The Chester Antiques Fair offers some key evidence on an debated issue of local history.

This rare pair of Minton majolica hen and rooster vases priced at £16,675 on the stand of Madelena will be among the highlights of the Arley Hall Antiques & Fine Art Fair in Cheshire which runs from September 28-30.

Two contrasting marine scenes, encapsulating the unpredictable nature of the sea, were offered at a recent sale at Mitchells (20% buyer’s premium) of Cockermouth in Cumbria.

Pitched at £20-40, a small bisque doll with jointed limbs, below, topped Mitchells’ (20% buyer’s premium) toys sale at Cockermouth on July 21.

A ship painting by the artist regarded as the first great Trinidadian painter, Michel-Jean Cazabon (1813-88), surfaced for sale at Cumbrian auction house PFK earlier this month.

Bill Clark runs Clark Art, which specialises in LS Lowry and modern British art, in Cheshire.

This Daum cameo and enamel vase decorated with a winter landscape from c.1900 is one of the pieces offered on the stand of Solo Antiques at the next Galloway Antiques Fair, where it is priced at £5950.

Two 1859 firsts of Darwin’s On the Origin of Species…, neither in what could be called good condition, made very strong prices in recent weeks. This is a book nowadays so desirable that such shortcomings can be overlooked.

“The best piece in the sale,” enthused auctioneer Richard Harrison in reference to a Meiji Kazaridana cabinet sold for £11,000 at Mitchells (20% buyer’s premium) at Cockermouth on June 13-15.

Running to just over a hundred pages and containing numerous illustrations of ships, figureheads and portrait busts, an accounts ledger kept by a Cumbrian shipbuilder has gone to a local museum.

Like many businesses scarred with bomb damage in post-war Britain, Lyons teashops were in need of cheering up.

Hard-paste figures of Russian ethnic characters and workers have appeared at English auctions on a number of occasions in recent years (ATGs passim), generally to keen interest from the Motherland and eastern Europe.

In the early development of motion pictures, this Kinora viewer, below, was the high end of the hugely popular ‘flip-book’ film machines.

Lancashire County Council is to reopen Lancaster Judges’ Lodgings, home to a key collection of Gillows furniture.