Fairs, Markets, Shops and Centres

Antiques dealers of Portobello Road must jostle for space with souvenir traders. But a new breed of seller is determined to maintain the area’s antiques heritage.

The 18th century Église St Sulpice in Paris’ 6th arrondissement is one of the city’s most ornate churches, full of architectural and ornamental masterpieces.

The country house car boot season, mostly held to raise funds for charities, is dominated by the mammoth annual fixture held in the grounds of Wilton House, near Salisbury, the seat of the Earls of Pembroke.

It’s a full-on ‘green’ home theme for this year’s annual architectural salvage fest at the Fawley Hill Estate near Henley-on-Thames.

A stand-out 1930s Art Deco onyx table lamp from Belgium is one of the highlights of Style 1900’s 20th Century Decorative Arts Fair. It will be held at the De La Warr Pavilion in Bexhill-on- Sea in East Sussex on Saturday and Sunday, June 17-18.

An early rare Lowestoft teapot and cover and a pair of 19th century glass marriage tankards from York are just two of the highlights at the third annual York Antiques, Decoratives & Fine Arts Fair.

The fairs scene is largely thriving, as evidenced by the number of new event launches reported in Antiques Trade Gazette. This week brings news of two more, both in the east of England.

Matthew Adams has announced that he has been able to fit in an extra date in June for his monthly Sunday antiques fairs held at the Royal Horticultural Halls in London’s SW1.

Last October we reported that Oxford’s Antiques on High’s owner, antiquarian book dealer Tony Sloggett, wanted to retire and find a new owner for the antiques centre which has traded in the city for 20 years. The situation remains unchanged, however, and it is business as usual at the centre for now.

A sketchbook by the Bavarian artist Georg Johann Scharf (1788-1860) was discovered recently by ephemera dealer Valerie Jackson-Harris at the Sunbury Antiques Market at Kempton Park.

Built from the 13th century onwards and the ancestral home and seat of the Stonor family for more than eight centuries, Stonor House near Henley-on-Thames is the backdrop for the biannual country house boot held in the parklands of the estate.

An 18th century silver mechanical lifesize musical swan that catches a fish out of a crystal stream entranced Mark Twain when he saw it an exhibition in Paris in 1867.

If you don’t know which epic film opens with the phrase ‘A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away….’ then you may just be living on a different planet.

One of the cameras mentioned in John Wade’s fascinating new book 'The Ingenious Victorians' is the Mammoth.

The ancient Romans believed that no matter what happened in the world or how many empires came and collapsed, Rome would live forever. Hence its description by the Roman poet Tibullus in the 1st century BC as the Eternal City.

Just as CDs and then downloads led to warnings of the demise of vinyl, the vintage camera collecting field was also predicted to be affected with the advancement of digital cameras. But both collecting fields are far from dead.

One of the 15 new exhibitors at Bowman Antiques Fairs’ antiques and art fair at the Great Yorkshire Showground in Harrogate on Saturday and Sunday, May 20-21, is Belgian dealer Frank van Laer from Antwerp who trades in decorative pieces.

The calm and grassy plain by the River Welland in the middle of the town of Stamford where Field Dog Fairs holds a biannual event was not always so serene.

Antique dolls supremo Judy Bebber has been organising the biannual Kensington Doll Show at Kensington Town Hall for 20 years.

Described as a building full of clues and symbolism created by its architects John Seely and Paul Paget, Eltham Palace was designed in 1933 for the vastly rich art collectors Virginia and Stephen Courtauld of textiles fame.