News

Sales in the USA 20th Century Lighting and Quality Antiques was the title of the $2.2m (£1,549,295) January 27 sale conducted by Fontaine Auction Gallery (12 per cent buyer’s premium) in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, but it was certainly the former that made this quarterly catalogue so noteworthy. Of 497 lots offered, almost 200 were occupied by table/boudoir lamps, light fittings shades and stained glass panels by the likes of Handel, Pairpoint, Suess and, of course, the Tiffany Studios.

UK: FOLLOWING these Surrey room’s Gaudy Welsh extravaganza last November, a further 40 pieces featured in their 500-lot January sale.

FRANCE: NOT exactly what you might choose to wear on St Valentine’s Day but this was the array of iron headwear on offer at the Etude Tajan Haute Epoque sale at Drouot on February 14.

Ceramics – The Jack Hacking Collection UK: THE JACK Hacking collection of English ceramics, offered by Phillips’ Bayswater (15/10 per cent buyer’s premium) rooms back on January 23, was a less academic, more eclectic property than Norman Stretton’s. But it was not by any means a general collection since it had quite specific areas of interest.

ITALY: NOW that Christie’s numismatic sales have been subsumed into Spink’s they are no longer held in London. However, they offered some very appealing pieces in Rome on December 13 and 14.

London: Back in the 1860s, long before the days of Action Man and GI Joe, what did a young lad do if he wanted a manly miniature role model, a real boy’s toy?

SWITZERLAND: ABOUT 75 people filled the room at the Tkalec sale of Greek and Roman coins on February 19. For collectors of useless information (and aren’t we all?) I can report that the T of Tkalec is not pronounced and that the name is the old Croat equivalent of ‘Weaver’.