East Midlands

Pictured right is a Yongzheng period (1723-1735) egg-yolk yellow ground ‘cranes’ bowl that was offered on the second day of a three-day sale conducted by Bamfords in Derby from September 13-15.

Charles Hanson, formerly of Wintertons, launches his own auction business next month.

Lincolnshire auctioneers Golding Young established a new house record on August 10 when they sold this superb mahogany breakfront side cabinet right for £135,000 (plus 15 per cent buyer’s premium).

Two very good stick barometers, in the popular 1820s form with bowfront and ebony-inlaid mahogany cases, were among the highlights at Grantham.

As celebrations abound for the most famous of all seamen, another great British admiral was being remembered in spectacular fashion at the Nottingham auction rooms of Mellors & Kirk on June 16. The subject of a fierce engagement between collectors was the so-called Rodney Jug.

In the centre of Lincoln stands the Westgate Water Tower, built between 1905 and 1911 to provide the city with clean drinking water, but also as a permanent reminder of the major typhoid epidemic that hit the city between November 1904 and April 1905.

Moorcroft miniatures are a collecting field in their own right. Anyone who owns a copy of Paul Atterbury’s book Moorcroft will be aware from the sleeve illustration just how many of the factory patterns were produced in miniature, often requiring an extra delicacy of touch on the part of the designer, potter and decorator.

OFTEN I have commented that the annual Buxton Antiques Fair, the 41st of which was held in the Pavilion Gardens of the Derbyshire spa town from May 11 to 15, keeps a low national profile.

ARMS and armour sales, which themselves encompass a myriad special interests, are another area with their own micro-economy impervious to whatever wild winds are blowing in the wider market.

Are you sitting comfortably? Then I’ll begin. You may be sitting on the very chair that could solve a mystery.

Gilding’s, Market Harborough, March 8, Buyer’s premium: 12.5 per centTHE decision by Leicestershire auctioneers Gilding’s to cut back their fine sales from six a year to quarterly events is perhaps a sign of the times, but the 510 lots offered in March appeared to signal that the shires are weathering the depression.

On a day when some unusual offerings caught the eye at the Nottingham sale held by Mellors & Kirk, one such lot was a set of 36 Anglo-Indian Company School Delhi or Agra oval miniatures dating to 1827 and depicting India’s nobility and their wives, six of whom are shown right.

The Fine Art Auction Group, parent company of Dreweatt Neate Fine Art and Neales of Nottingham, will be the major sponsor of the Art of Dealing conference at the Earls Court Conference Centre in London on May 16.

Hamptons Fine Art Auctioneers have become the latest regional auction business to join The Fine Art Auction Group, parent company of Dreweatt Neate Fine Art and Neales of Nottingham.

SOME months ago I reported that Reindeer Antiques from Northamptonshire were planning a Reindeer Antiques Centre. That is now up and running and officially opened to the public on January 2.

HAVING had to drop plans for a fill-in fair between Swinderby and Newark at RAF Wymeswold, Jaguar Fairs will now launch one at the Lincolnshire Showground instead.

Complete with its original bill of sale and warranty, this fine 18ct gold chronograph minute repeater pocket watch made by London maker J.W. Benson sold into the trade for £3100 at John Taylor’s (12% buyer’s premium) of Louth on December 7.

NOTTINGHAM auctioneers Neales have become the latest business to join the Fine Art Auction Group, parent company of the Dreweatt Neate Fine Art group of regional auctioneers.

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.

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