Collectables

A new record for any item sold in an online-only sale at Sotheby’s was set when the Nobel Memorial Prize for Economic Science awarded to Friedrich von Hayek (1899-1982) sold for £950,000.

For just one day in April, Bonhams New Bond Street saleroom will host an exhibition in celebration of the centenary of the legendary car marque Bentley.

She wrote two of the 20th century’s great masterpieces of fiction. Now on the 30th anniversary of her death, letters and photos relating to ‘Rebecca’ and ‘Jamaica Inn’ author Daphne du Maurier will go under the hammer at an Ely auction house.

A collection of watercolours, drawings and letters by American painter George Catlin (1796-1872) will be offered at Forum Auctions next week.

Beans manufacturer Heinz has paid a hammer price of £750 at auction for a special issue 18ct gold baked bean.

Running to just 60 or so pages, a little promotional work called ‘Autotypography: Or Art of Nature-Printing...’ coming up for sale in Devon on March 26 proves to have a rather complex tale to tell.

In 1977, three years before his untimely death, Joy Division’s singer songwriter Ian Curtis wrote the lyrics to ‘Failures’: “Wise words and sympathy/Tell the story of our history.”

A previously undocumented archive of writings by Edward Carpenter, the well-connected socialist poet and gay rights pioneer, sold for a hammer price of £4200, more than eight times its upper estimate, at Bamfords in Derby this month.

A rediscovered melody by Sir Edward Elgar will be offered at auction in Lichfield after it was found in an autograph book.

A small piece of Star Wars action figure history comes for sale at Vectis Auctions in Thornaby, Stockton-on-Tees next month.

A tape thought to contain “possibly the first ever demo version” of David Bowie’s 1972 hit ‘Starman’ drew strong competition at Omega Auctions’ latest sale.

Letters from Princess Diana written in the late 1980s and early 90s to a leading fashion magazine editor are coming to auction in New York.