Auction Reports

Ecclesiastic buildings can be the source of good secular antiques: typically items bequeathed in the distant past by parishioners for church use.

Specialist auctions staged in Stowmarket with expert input show encouraging signs

This 18ct gold and enamel medal was awarded to Reginald Arthur Whitcombe (1898-1957) for winning the 1936 Open Golf Championship of Ireland.

A 1926 London Transport poster with artwork by Montague Birrell Black (1889-1964) imagining what the capital may look 100 years into the future was offered at Ewbank’s (25% buyer’s premium) in Woking on January 21.

The Palais Royale built for Cardinal Richelieu in 1629 had a variety of uses over the years but in the 18th and early 19th century was rebuilt as a place for public recreation and social gathering.

A Plymouth solicitor’s lifetime appreciation of West Country silver was shared by enthusiastic bidders at Chilcotts’ (21% buyer’s premium) Honiton rooms.

Among the more unusual recent lots at Woolley & Wallis (25% buyer’s premium) was an early Victorian table carved from parrot coal.

Bidders backing their judgment sent two lots to 20-times estimates at Mallams’ (25% buyer’s premium) jewellery and silver sale

A new auction record for Edward Barnsley was among the many highlights of the Minoprio collection of Cotswold School furniture sold by Lyon & Turnbull (25% buyer’s premium).

This fine example of Vienna Secession furniture was bought last year in a junk shop on the south coast for just £5.

Greywacke sculpture headlines a series of high-flying results including £66,000 double bass

Although catalogued by Smiths of Newent (20% buyer’s premium) as a chair from the early 19th century Empire period, this ebonised mahogany, gilt and polychrome side chair is more probably from the mid-Victorian period.

The recent release of 'The Electrical Life of Louis Wain' starring Benedict Cumberbatch provided a topical spin to this rare Amphora pottery model.

At the top end of the budget for ski poster enthusiasts are the Art Deco images promoting Gstaad.

Marked for Savage & Lyman, Montreal, c.1855-60, this silver tankard was awarded to British bare-knuckle boxer Tom Sayers.

A rare Royal Crown Derby teapot made to a design created by Salvador Dalí surfaced recently at Batemans (20% buyer’s premium) in Stamford.

A selection of these functional but fascinating objects that have appeared at recent sales

Estimated at just £60-100, a pair of Georgian portrait miniatures sold online for £2900 at Amersham Auctions (17.5% buyer’s premium) on January 6.

Handed in by miners at the start of a shift in exchange for a Davy lamp, colliery tokens, tallies or checks provided vital information in the event of fire or explosion.

Grand Canal sketch has provenance to artist’s student who became a renowned collector