South-east England

“As soon as the vendor pulled the board from her bag, I recognised something of serious interest.”

Grandma’s Attic Fairs has announced that its quarterly antiques and collectors’ fairs at the Botleigh Grange Hotel in Southampton have ceased due to the hotel’s sudden closure in mid-January, although a new venue has been found.

Popular in the first decades of the 19th century, the eight-key flute is something of a transitional instrument, retaining many of the characteristics of the earlier baroque flute and the modern instrument.

Two large watercolours painted by Y Ba Nyan (1897-1947), one of Burma’s most influential Modern artists, emerged for sale in Folkestone at the end of last year.

A dealer in the antiques-rich town of Petworth is launching a vintage, antiques and militaria fair in her hometown of Petersfield in Hampshire.

Estimated at £2000-3000, this French gold and enamel bracelet set with seven oval carved hardstone intaglios sold for £8500 (plus 20% buyer premium) at Henry Adams of Chichester on January 16.

To celebrate the centenary this year of the Roaring Twenties, Sharon Blagrove of Bentleys Fairs is adding a second themed 1920s event in Sussex to her portfolio this year.

Edenbridge Galleries is closing after 13 years with owners Lennox and Susan Cato saying they want to concentrate on their own business.

The English artist, illustrator and author Christopher ‘Kit’ Williams (b.1946) is best known for the book 'Masquerade', the pictorial storybook which contained clues to the location of an 18ct gold jewelled hare buried somewhere in the British countryside. It created quite a sensation in 1979.

A total of eight Victorian stone animal troughs have been stolen in recent months, with the latest two disappearing from Tunbridge Wells in Kent.

This ‘Black Forest’ type clock on the theme of hunting is signed by Swiss master carver Johann Huggler of Brienz (1834-1912).

A pair of Russian Empire chairs, 1810-15, featuring striking decorative brass inlay is offered for £25,000 by Ellis Fine Art at the Petersfield Antiques Fair.

It’s a hectic time for Bournemouth-based fair organisers Chris Brown and Geoff Fagan of Grandma’s Attic Fairs as they reorganise their fairs portfolio following their acquisition of the family-run Emmott Promotions.

This pair of 19th century electroplated cups, offered by Andrew Smith & Son (21% buyer’s premium) in Alresford on December 11, is stamped for the noted Sydney silversmith Evan Jones (1846-1917).

An atypical visitor to a recent sale at Canterbury Auction Galleries (24% buyer’s premium) was a Norwegian silver gilt brudekrone dating from the late 18th or early 19th century.

Alongside pieces made in Kinsale, Galway and Waterford, silver from the small County Cork town of Youghal is among the scarcest of all Irish provincial silver. Only a handful of pieces survive that carry the punning town mark of a yawl.