Auctions: Out of season bargains
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Your support makes all the difference.MINOR, off-season sales in London this week should be good for a rummage. Christie's South Kensington has jewellery mostly in the pounds 150- pounds 1,000 range Wednesday (2pm). This is not necessarily a good buy in a recession: small Georgian items, for example, are out of vogue, with prices bumping along the lower estimates. Diamond solitaire rings are only keeping pace with inflation - but remember that a diamond ring bought at auction is likely to be half the price of the same ring in the high street.
The market for Victorian jewellery is firm and Edwardian jewellery, approaching the 100-year qualifying age for antiques, is even firmer, pushing higher estimates. Look for well-made pieces with modest, traditional shapes such as ovals and foliates. Ignore novelties. Worst buy: Victorian jewellery featuring real tropical beetles or tigers' claws, an affront to today's environmental sensibility.
UNDER CANVAS
Phillips West Two has a jolly, 289-lot sale of modern and 19th- century oils, watercolours and prints, Wednesday (12 noon), one of its regular monthly sales. (There have been no weekly sales for two years, which says something about the market.) Even with estimates in the pounds 60- pounds 300 range, the recession ensures that bidders are discriminating and auctioneers keen not to offer junk daubs or damaged stock.
ROMANTIC BONDAGE
Bloomsbury Book Auctions, Thursday (1pm) has a collection of French 19th-century books in 'romantic' bindings - elaborate gilt-stamped boards, hand- coloured vignettes. Titles, such as Les Jeunes Moralistes by Victor Doublet, are less romantic. Estimates: pounds 120- pounds 180 for 14 books is typical.
COUNTRYWIDE
Cirencester: Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain's fishing tackle, Friday (10am): his Hardy reel is expected to fetch pounds 300, hand-tied flies pounds 30- pounds 50 per lot of 20 or so. Moore, Allen and Innocent, 33 Castle Street (0285 651831).
Auchterarder: Sotheby's Scottish and sporting sale at Gleneagles Hotel, Monday and Tuesday. Samuel Peploe's The Ginger Jar, est pounds 60,000- pounds 80,000, is among 20 pictures by the Scottish colourists. There are several Archibald Thorburns - his A Golden Eagle is est pounds 8,000- pounds 12,000. A family of six Wemyss ceramic pigs decorated with shamrocks, c1930, is est pounds 2,000- pounds 3,000. Monday from 10.30am: silver, jewellery, Wemyss-ware, sporting guns. Tuesday 5pm and 8pm: pictures (031 226 7201).
Weymouth: On-site sale at the College of the Sacred Heart, Wednesday (11am) offers communion tables, a Portland stone altar, classroom furniture, musical instruments including a Bechstein grand piano, computer equipment, domestic furniture, and seven Brunsden limited edition prints. Edward Symmons (0703 779778).
Bath: More than 350 lots of musical instruments, Friday (1pm): violins and violas by or attributed to Chanot, Vuillaume, Gaillard, Barbieri and Cuypers, 30 flutes by known makers, clarinets, saxophones, trumpets. Gardiner Houlgate, The Old Malthouse, Comfortable Place, Upper Bristol Road (0225 447933).
Southampton: Peace dividend at the Forte Posthouse Hotel with surplus Ministry of Defence stores located from Weybridge to Woolwich but identified in catalogue ( pounds 3). Electrical components, outboard motors, cameras, clothes, carpets, curtains, furniture. Austin & Wyatt (0489 893466).
Aberfoyle: Entire contents of an antique pine and country furniture shop, including rocking horses, today (11am): Blarnaboard Farm, Gartmore. West Perthshire Auctions (0764 70613).
Wigan: Office furniture and equipment, household and garden goods, Tuesday (10.30am) at Unit 3, Pagefield Industrial Estate. Nod Wink Wink Auctioneering Co (0942 829692).
Rotherham: Georgian, Regency and Victorian furniture, pictures, porcelain, jewellery and collectables, Monday (11am).
Wilkinson & Beighton, Woodhouse Green, Thurcroft (0709 700005).
Malmesbury: Monthly sale by leading catering equipment auctioneers Hilditch and Co, Tuesday (10am) - more than 1,000 lots, including copperware, fax machines, photocopiers. Trading Estate (0666 822577).
Leominster: More than 1,000 lots of antiques and effects, Wednesday (10am). Furniture, porcelain, paintings, Thursday (10am). Russell Baldwin & Bright, Ryelands Road (0568 611166).
Glasgow: Quarterly police clearance sale of lost, stolen, and strayed items, Monday and Tuesday (11am daily). Robert McTears, Northcourt Lane, St Vincent (041 221 4456).
Countrywide sales supplied by Antiques Trade Gazette (071-930 4957) and Government Auction News (071-734 8291/4).
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