Vase

Getting Sotheby’s Olympia’s (20/12% buyer’s premium) 288-lot April 2 sale of British and European Ceramics off to a brisk start was a well received section devoted to early Italian maiolica, Dutch Delft and other tin-glazed earthenwares.

There was a French auction record for Sèvres under the Ferri (17.94%/ 11.96% buyer’s premium) gavel at Drouot on May 24 when the large Empire period fuseau vase, shown here, was offered for sale.

This Chamberlains Worcester yellow ground beaker-shaped vase c.1802, painted with a figure emblematic of Fame and supporting a miniature of Admiral Lord Nelson to commemorate the battle of the Nile, appeared at Law Fine Art on May 22 with an estimate of £4000-6000, having been consigned by a “Middle England” collector.

A pair of ornamental blue and gold vases made by the Manufacture Impériale in St Petersburg (c.1825-30) soared to €520,000 (£335,000) at Beaussant-Lefèvre on April 10.

Over the last six months Amersham Auction Rooms have reported an increase in prices for ceramics and collectables in contrast to static or falling bids placed for furniture.

Topping this 740-lot sale on 25-26 January at Raymond Inman's was a pair of Royal Worcester two-handled vases painted by Charles Baldwyn, one of the most distinguished Worcester designers, with images of swans on a river with raised water reeds to one side and flying swans to the other.

This unrecorded, William Billingsley painted campana vase appeared at Woolley and Wallis’s sale in Salisbury on November 28, and not without great controversy.

Highly desirable Clarice Cliff Blue Lucerne globular vase, 6in (15cm) high, shape 370, decorated with a stylised geometric Mediterranean landscape.

Comtemporary Ceramics UK: WITH THEIR big event scheduled for June, Bonhams (15/10 per cent buyer’s premium) March 25 Contemporary Ceramics sale was very much a mid-season affair.