Old world grandeur, stylish interior décor items and unusual collectables attracted bidders at Hansons’ May Country House Attic Auction at Bishton Hall.
Top-selling lots included a pair of early 20th century George III revival giltwood wall mirrors, featuring pierced foliage decoration on a composition oval frame. They sold for £800.
Meanwhile, summer dinner parties are gaining an elegant uplift thanks to the sale of an extensive Minton Haddon Hall dinner and tea service. Including salt and pepper, mustard pot and two candlesticks, it sold for £300.
Still on a summer theme, two cast garden benches with wooden seat rails together with a cast table with wooden top sold for £260. Perfect for those garden soirees.
The sale included several antiques of Masonic interest. For example, an early 19th Century clear glass double spout flask with Masonic engravings was contested to £130. Bearing initials and the date 1821, it came from Lodge No.128 – possibly St John’s, Shettleston, Glasgow. It was purchased by a Masonic museum.
Particularly fascinating was an early-19th century sewing companion, ornately bound in contrasting gilt calf with yellow metal lock, silk-lined interior with needle flannel, mirror, comb and scissors. It contained a note, ‘Ladies Companion or Pocket Book Given to my great Grandmother by Sarah Clarke, sister of Capt Clarke, who went on voyages with Captn. Cook’.
It sold together together with a handful of antiquarian books, Martin Cash, the Bushranger of Van Diemen’s Land in 1843, Tasmania; Hobart, Walch, no date, in publisher’s worn paper covers, and Culpeper’s Complete Herbal, London: Milner & Sowerby, 1867. The sewing companion and accompanying items sold for £170.
Hansons’ Country House Attic Auction was held at Bishton Hall, Staffordshire, on May 12, 2021. If you are considering selling at auction and would like to arrange a free valuation or home visit, please email: [email protected] or [email protected]
Click here to find out free about valuations at Bishton Hall, Wolseley Bridge, Staffordshire.
