News

ARTHUR Swallow Fairs, organisers of the giant antiques and collectors’ event at the Lincolnshire Showground, will launch two new fairs this year.

THE original autograph stock book of Sir Lawrence Alma Tadema, found in a box of girlie magazines, sold for £25,000 (plus 17% buyer's premium) at the Shropshire auctioneers Mullock's in Ludlow.

MOST Star Wars aficionados are familiar with the story of the Flintshire pensioner who bought 20 Palitoy action figures for 49p each in 1978 and sold them at Stockton-on-Tees toy specialists Vectis for a small fortune in 2003.

CANTERBURY Auction Galleries are to embark on a new sales format that will double the number of fine sales held annually and offer every lot to a potential worldwide audience of Internet bidders.

FROM 30 June, the £20 banknote carrying the portrait of composer Sir Edward Elgar is to be finally withdrawn from circulation.

AFTER being closed since early March, The Good Fairy Market in Portobello Road reopened on May 8, to the surprise of some dealers at the Saturday market.

CONTRIBUTING handsomely to the largest grossing sale ever conducted by a regional auctioneer, this 7in (18cm) high Chinese Imperial white jade bell sold for £2m hammer at Woolley & Wallis of Salisbury on May 19 – the first day of a two-catalogue Asian art sale.