Stoke-on-Trent

Staffordshire’s Potteries Auctions is expanding with a second saleroom to increase its auction frequency to two a month.

A collection of Iron Age gold jewellery is to go on display at Stoke-on-Trent’s Potteries Museum & Art Gallery after fundraising hit the £325,000 target.

The Potteries Museum & Art Gallery in Stoke-on-Trent had a double celebration today when it welcomed home a vase by master potter Josiah Wedgwood and launched a fundraising campaign to buy the Leekfrith Iron Age Torcs.

Stoke-on-Trent’s Potteries Museum & Art Gallery is hopeful of raising nearly half a million pounds to buy a Wedgwood First Day’s vase after it was awarded a £90,000 grant from the Art Fund.

A series of deals to safeguard the future of the Wedgwood Collection and ensure it will continue to be displayed in the Potteries have now been completed.

A trial model of a champion dog led the way among a group of Beswick figures sold at a recent auction in Stoke-on-Trent.

There are promising signs for the future of the Wedgwood Museum thanks to planning approval given to redevelop the site where it is based near Stoke-on-Trent.

The attractions of variations from run-of-the-mill ceramics extends to all factories, and the recent sale of a Royal Doulton 'Nelson' jug showed how the presence of a rare backstamp mark can increase the value of an item 100 times over.

AN extraordinary legal loophole threatens to decimate the unique collection of the award-winning Wedgwood Museum in Stoke-on-Trent.

SEVERE weather conditions have badly damaged the marquee which Antique Forum use for their six annual weekend fairs held at Trentham Gardens, near Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire.

THIS outstanding Louise Rayner (1832-1924) watercolour, depicting the Butter Market at Ludlow, Shropshire, posted a new house record for Louis Taylor of Stoke-on-Trent at their latest sale.

THIS year was the second successful three-day Ceramics Festival held at Stoke-on-Trent in October, which is maybe surprising for a place which owes its very existence to pottery and is regarded by many, most particularly Paul Atterbury, the festival patron, as “the ceramics centre of the Western world”.

A funding package worth £7m has been agreed allowing construction to begin on a new Wedgwood Museum in the heart of the Potteries at the company’s Barlaston headquarters.

ENTERPRISING Essex organiser Robert Bailey seldom seems to stop moving round the country and this holiday weekend sees him in the heart of the Potteries.

Remarkable things continue to happen in the Beswick market. Consider the fortunes of a handful of scarce, but damaged, models seen recently at the Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent rooms of Louis Taylor (12.5% buyer’s premium).

Given the Potteries location, it is hardly surprising that Royal Doulton and Beswick have long provided Louis Taylor (12.5% buyer's premium) with their bread-and-butter business as well as many top lots. The first day of their quarterly fine sales is always devoted to these staples, predominantly sourced from private vendors living within a 50-mile radius of the Hanley rooms.

IN Louis Taylor's (12.5% buyer's premium) 700-lot General and Victoriana Hanley outing on July 12, it was the small collectable entries that generated some of the top prices with a Beswick Lipizaner horse and rider fetching £245, despite extensive damage, and a silver cigar box commemorating Winston Churchill selling at £240.