Fairs and Markets

ESTABLISHED in 1976, the annual West London Antiques Fair is traditionally the first quality fair of the year and a sure sign that the trade is well and truly back in harness after the seasonal break.

AFTER 43 years, the annual Original Miami Beach Antique Show is a world attraction but, despite its longevity, it still rings the changes, as you will see at this year’s staging from January 20 to 24 at the Miami Beach Convention Center, 1901 Convention Center Drive.

CARMARTHEN’S own Towy Antiques Fairs ended the year on a high note with good sales across the board at their Christmas Carmarthen Antiques & Collectors’ Fair, held at the local showground on December 11 and 12.

CONSOLIDATING his comeback, Reg Cooper, who now operates as Caminade Antiques Fairs, encountered a bit of old-fashioned fair wars skulduggery at his second Oxfordshire Antiques Fair, held from December 10 to 12 at Heythrop Park.

LAPADA will return to The Centaur at Cheltenham Racecourse for their 2005 Autumn Antiques and Fine Art Fair following last month’s inaugural event there. It will again be organised by Ingrid Nilson.

WEST Midlands Police have arrested three people from Birmingham in connection with the theft of Staffordshire figures from the Antiques for Everyone fair after the items were spotted on eBay.

DMG Antiques Fairs have put up £350,000 for a new building at the Newark and Nottinghamshire Showground and secured the venue for another 20 years.

NEXT spring Caroline Penman launches a new fair at Chelsea Old Town Hall in King’s Road, London SW3. It will be called The King’s Road Antiques Fair and will run from March 11 to 13.

CLARION Events, organisers of the Olympia Fine Art and Antiques Fairs, have successfully completed a £45m management buy-out from their parent company, the Earls Court & Olympia Group (EC&O). They emphasise their continued commitment to the antiques fairs.

JAGUAR Fairs say they will launch an event to fill the gap now created between the Swinderby and Newark fairs.

DMG Antique Fairs have reconfirmed their commitment to the new three-day format Newark fairs for 2005. Acknowledging that many people had voiced strong views that had not gone unheard, managing director Jason Franks emphasised dmg’s long-term commitment to the fair in terms of promotion and investment linked to a weekend slot.

AS certain as Autumn’s falling leaves, the scam fair guides have come out of the woodwork once more to trap dealers in the run-up to the Winter Olympia fair.

NEXT year Arthur Swallow Fairs’ International Antiques and Collectors’ Fairs at RAF Swinderby will be held almost a full week before the Newark fair.

NEXT year’s Watercolour and Drawings Fair will move to a new venue, the Royal Academy rooms at 6 Burlington Gardens, London W1, where it will run from February 3 to 6 with an opening evening preview on February 2.

HAVING staged fairs with varying success in Birmingham and London, LAPADA, our largest trade association, enters a new era this month with the launch of a new event at a new venue – The LAPADA Autumn Antiques and Fine Art Fair which will run at The Centaur at Cheltenham Racecourse, Gloucestershire from October 21 to 24.

FRENCH dealer in Chinese antique stands, Laurence Paul, is currently showing at an antiques fair in Beijing, but she will be back in time for the first monthly Sunday fair of her winter season on October 17 at the Thistle Kensington Palace Hotel, London W8.

UNTIL this Sunday (October 17), the second Art Deco Fair to be organised by Woburn Abbey Antiques Centre runs in the Russell, Howland and Bedford Rooms of the North Court of Woburn Abbey.

DEALER and, more recently, fair organiser, Jan Hicks moves to the grounds of Loseley Park, a 16th century house near Guildford, Surrey, for her third Antiques & Audacity fair from May 12 to 15 next year.

IT looks very much like the end of the road for one of our long-running provincial fixtures, the Surrey Antiques Fair, the 36th annual staging of which was held from October 2 to 5 last year.

JUST a week after they dismantle the stands of their art and design fair, London-based organisers Brian and Anna Haughton return to the Seventh Regiment Armory, Park Avenue at 67th St, New York for their 16th annual International Fine Art and Antique Dealers Show.