South-west England

THE National Association of Valuers and Auctioneers will hold their annual summer conference between 10am and 5pm on June 15 at Manor House Golf Club, Castle Combe in Wiltshire.

One of the largest and longest-established antiques centres in the UK, Gloucester Antiques Centre, will be moving to a new dockside location after planning permission has been granted for relocation nearby.

BOOK dealers are turning auctioneers and fair organisers in a bid to generate new income.

COOPER Fairs have bought The Buxton Antiques Fair, at one time among the most prestigious of provincial fixtures.

BY 1780, John Trumbull (1756-1843), a budding young artist from Lebanon, Connecticut who had sketched the Revolutionary War, found himself in grave difficulty.

Melting bidders' hearts in a snow-covered Dorchester, this rare Doulton figure of a little girl cradling a doll proved the star attraction at Duke's sale on February 5-6.

WOOLLEY and Wallis silver specialist Alex Butcher is well known for his expertise in the spoon world, but his most recent offering at the Salisbury saleroom took the specialisation a step further.

Remarkable for both their size and their original condition, this pair of Italian console tables c,1760 sold for £28,000 Semley Auctioneers of Shaftesbury in Dorset on January 24.

Lawrences of Crewkerne are to sell items of stock from former antiques dealers Dodge and Son Limited of Sherborne. The instructions come from the dealership’s administrators, Bishop Fleming.

AT points, the catalogue of items from the Vaughan family collection sounded like the script for ‘Monty Python and The Holy Grail’.

Fifty-six works from the Vaughan family estate of Hengwrt, Nannau and Rug in Merionethshire, many of which have been in The Welsh Museum, Cardiff following the sale of the house several years ago, were dispersed without reserve by Tamlyn's of Bridgwater, Somerset, on December 9.

SO-CALLED castle-top boxes represent a fascinating moment in British social history. Fashioned by the silver ‘toy’ makers of Birmingham, these vinaigrettes and card cases engraved or die-stamped with British landmarks were seemingly marketed as tourist souvenirs.

Recently sold at auction, three examples of the well-known Nelson memorial vinaigrette made by Matthew Linwood of Birmingham in 1805 sold for markedly different prices – and for good reason.

THE discerning collection of Chinese jades, rhinoceros horn, furniture, textiles and paintings assembled 200 years ago by John Reeves has now gone under the hammer.

A VOLUNTEER at the Royal Signals Regiment Museum in Blandford, Dorset, has been jailed for 12 months for stealing £33,000 of medals and selling them on eBay.

TWO of the West Country’s foremost fine art auctioneers, Bearne’s and Hampton & Littlewood, are to merge to become the biggest business of its kind in the South West.

The falling stock markets that have dented the wealth of Russia’s rich have yet to impinge upon the appetite for the output of Karl Fabergé.

A PAIR of silver 18th century Dutch candle snuffers thought to have been a gift from Bonnie Prince Charlie sold for £9800 at Hampton & Littlewood of Exeter on October 30. Measuring 8in (20cm) high, the snuffers and holder were passed down through the MacDonald family to the descendant who entered them for auction.

Smallwork remains one of the most collectable areas of the silver market, and Dorchester auctioneers Duke's will be aiming to tempt enthusiasts for one particular corner of this arena later this month.

Offered at Lawrences of Crewkerne on October 16, this Ming dynasty blue and white brushwasher has Xuande (1425-1435) character marks and is of the period.