Furniture

WITH the autumn season well underway, it’s good to see a number of dealers promoting business with selling exhibitions which, apart from anything else, present a confident looking trade to the world. Second generation West Sussex furniture dealer Frank Wilson, owner of Wilsons Antiques, has held such an exhibition in Worthing every year since the early 1990s and this autumn’s event will run from September 28 to October 2 at his showrooms at 45-47 New Broadway, Tarring Road.

JULY may now seem like ancient history but it is worth putting on record the wholly unexpected performance of a late Regency period circular dining table offered by Mallams (15% buyer’s premium) from their Cheltenham rooms on July 22.

JUST shy of their bicentenary, Whytock and Reid, the Edinburgh furniture makers, were forced into liquidation earlier this year. Foreign competition put paid to a company established in 1807 by Richard Whytock and John Reid that, in its 19th and early 20th century glory days, furnished the great houses and castles of Scotland, often working in partnership with the architect Robert Lorimer.

Furniture from Hills House, Denham, the property of Sir John and Lady Mills, will be sold at auction by Hamptons of Godalming on October 20.

MONMOUTH dealer Nick Wheatley – a specialist in Arts & Crafts, as the name of his shop Our House 1860-1925, at 6-8 St. James Street, implies – has also beeen building up for a show.

BULKY Victorian brown furniture may be the least attractive subject at many sales, but the most expensive entry at Keys (10% buyer's premium) 1386-lot Norfolk outing on August 3-4 was a 9ft square (2.74m) mahogany library breakfront bookcase.

GLOUCESTERSHIRE dealer Mike Golding, whose business Huntington Antiques in Stow on the Wold is known for early furniture, works of art and tapestries, has just sent out his latest catalogue of recent acquisitions, which will comprise his exhibition next month as part of the Cotswold Antique Dealers Association’s annual series of autumn selling shows.

WITH only eight of the 300 lots bringing four-figure sums, the Mallams (15% buyer's premium) sale on August 25 was a fairly sleepy summer affair by usual standards at Oxford, but there were pieces of interest throughout for budget-conscious bidders.

THE Badminton Cabinet, the magnificent 18th century ebony, ormolu and pietra dura cabinet made at the Grand Ducal workshops in Florence and sold by Christie for a record £7.8m in 1990 is to come back on the market again in December with the same auction house.

SOME provincial auctioneers and London’s major houses batten down their hatches during the traditionally dead month of August, but for Scarborough Perry (15% buyer's premium) it was business as usual for their August 12-13 sale.

CAPE Cod auctioneers Eldred’s of East Dennis had a busy August schedule and results from their series of Asian and Americana sales will appear in future US Selections, but seen here are two of the 970 lots found in an August 12-13 sale of Fine & Decorative Art.

THE biggest surprise in the July 17 sale held by Skinners of Boston was provided by a pair of Chinese chairs, but the pair of 3 7/8in (10cm) high, Wedgwood & Bentley blue jasper portrait medallions of c.1779 right, depicting William Penn & Benjamin Franklin, also did well.

LEADING specialist in early country furniture and distinctive period objects Robert Hirschhorn holds his fifth annual At Home selling exhibition at his Georgian house and showrooms in London’s Camberwell from September 16 to 19.

DEVON, with its old wealth and influx of well-heeled retired couples, can provide a rich hinterland, but summer can still mean a bit of a scramble to find enough quality material to offer at Bearne’s (15/10% buyer's preimum) fine quarterly sales at Exeter.

GOOD standard furniture sold well enough at Mitchell's (15% buyer's premium) July 15-16 sale and included a locally made Jacobean piece.

A QUALITY furniture grouping and a small, but strong, Oriental section contributed to the upbeat performance of Halls (15% buyer's premium) 258-lot sale on July 14, the top lot of which, a £24,000 George III mahogany longcase, was illustrated on the front cover of Antiques Trade Gazette No. 1650 dated July 31 and August 7.

KNOWN for her stock of top-quality, early furniture with character, Lucy Johnson holds a special selling exhibition this weekend from September 3 to 5 at her showroom, a 17th century stone barn just outside Burford on the Cotswold Wildlife Park Estate, Oxfordshire.

Originality and patina are key factors in the price of oak furniture. Accordingly, it was no surprise to see the trade chase this austere George III elm cricket table at Richard Winterton (12.5% buyer’s premium) of Burton-on-Trent on July 28. Entered by a Birmingham client, the table, with its galleried undertier was in fine original condition with no later adaptations and the timber had acquired a good rich patina. It doubled the pre-sale estimate to bring £950.

THE Victoria and Albert Museum’s main autumn exhibition, opening this month, is devoted to a retrospective of Christopher Dresser, the pioneering designer who anticipated many of the major design styles of the 20th century. It is timed to coincide with the centenary of his death in 1904.

SPECIALIST auctioneers, Ocean Liner Auctions have been instructed to sell what they consider to be the largest and finest collection of fixtures and fittings from RMS Olympic since the vessel was broken up almost 69 years ago.