News

Classic English furniture continues to bring good prices at auction providing the quality is there – and this Regency sofa table, right, certainly filled that requirement when it was offered at the March 3 sale in Cornwall held by Bonhams Par (17.5% buyer’s premium).

SOTHEBY’S auction and related revenues rose by more than 20 per cent, year on year, for the first quarter of 2005, coming in at $72.2m.

THE scientific tests stacked up. The catalogue description was fair. The buyer got what she paid for. But somehow Christie’s still managed to lose the High Court action brought by special client Taylor Lynne Thomson.

Andrew Hartley, Ilkley. Buyer’s premium: 10 per centSOME high individual prices but, for West Yorkshire auctioneers Andrew Hartley, an unusually high casualty rate of 29 per cent… “It was a very patchy market,” said Mr Hartley summing up what so many auctioneers are finding.

Regular readers of ATG saleroom reports will be all too aware of the recent price explosion of Minton’s pâte sur pâte ceramics. This highly distinctive, almost cameo-like form of carved slip decoration was perfected by Louis-Marc Solon who had his own special iconography of nymphs and putti engaged in a bewildering array of quirky pursuits.

A NUMBER of niche sales in spring once again showed why they are a matter of some envy among other auctioneers whose offerings are far more vulnerable to contrary winds of fashion and the general economy.

ARMS and armour sales, which themselves encompass a myriad special interests, are another area with their own micro-economy impervious to whatever wild winds are blowing in the wider market.