Antiques go home!

ANTIQUES are being repatriated after Moore Allen & Innocent’s Selected Sale on Friday, with hand-printed wallpaper en route to France, a silver coffee pot heading up the M5 to Birmingham, a wooden Maori club being packed for New Zealand and an embroidered sampler being reunited with the artist’s family.

Auctioneers had expected 32 rolls of hand-printed wallpaper featuring scenes of America circa 1834 to be bought by a collector in the States. In fact, Les Vues de L’Amerique du Nord was bought by an Austrian artist and will form part of an art installation at an exhibition in Paris later this year.

The wallpaper was produced by Jean Zuber et Cie in Rixhalm, France and is identical to a set that has adorned the walls of the famous oval diplomatic reception room at the White House since first lady Jacqueline Kennedy fell in love with it in the 1960s. Placed together, the rolls depict four famous landmarks – New York Bay, Boston Harbour, West Point Military Academy and Niagara Falls – over a continuous panoramic picture.

With an estimate of £1,000 to £1,500, auctioneers were delighted when the wallpaper achieved £4,600.

An Arts and Crafts silver coffee pot produced by the Birmingham Guild of Handicraft in 1904 has been purchased by the Birmingham Silver Assay for £900, where it was originally hallmarked, and will be displayed in a cabinet inside the company’s front door.

The Birmingham Assay is the organisation responsible for testing and hallmarking silver and gold, and is now the largest assay office in the world. What makes this reunion special is that it is understood that the artist who designed the 19cm coffee pot also designed the imposing Birmingham Assay office in Newhall Street in 1877.

A 19th century Maori carved wooden club will be making its way back to New Zealand, courtesy of a Kiwi collector, who bought the 43cm-long weapon for £1,400, exceeding the £300 to £500 estimate.

And a late Victorian needlework sampler inscribed ‘Fanny A Dingwall, Errol Public School, June 1890,’ featuring letters of the alphabet and numbers in various scripts, was bought by a member of the artist’s family for £100.

The top price of the day, however, was achieved by a late 17th century Chinese carved rhino horn libation cup, which sold at the top end of its £4,000 to £6,000 estimate at £6,600.

Surprise of the day was reserved for a circa 1900 Indian silk work wall hanging, which sold for £3,600 against an estimate of £200 to £300 despite its condition of general disrepair. And minutes later there was another shock when a Persian carpet with floral decoration, which had carried an estimate of £300 to £500, was bought for £2,500.

The next event at the Cirencester salerooms is the General and Antique sale on Friday, October 10.

	A late 17th century Chinese carved rhino horn libation cup.
An Arts and Crafts silver coffee pot;	A 19th century Maori carved wooden club
A scene depicting New York Harbour from the wallpaper series Les Vues de L’Amerique du Nord