2006 has been a very successful year for the salerooms with many highlights throughout.

The year started with us selling a stuffed and mounted giraffe (illustrated below) in the February Sporting Sale, and a fantastic Fabergé nephrite circular pill box (illustrated below) for a hammer price £64,000 in the first Selected Sale of the year in March. April’s Selected Picture Sale continued the success of the first set of specialist sales seeing us sell a pair of 18th Century English School portrait studies for £12,500 and a Vincenzo Corsi After Raphael “Madonna Della Sedia” oil on panel (illustrated below) from the same Estate for £4,200.

 In June a pair of late Regency mahogany fold over card tables made £12,000 and in the same sale a 19th Century burr and pollard oak veneered sofa table £3,200. The August Antique and General Sale which offered the residual items formerly of ‘Nether Lypiatt Manor’, being the property of their Royal Highnesses Prince and Princess Michael of Kent, attracted the crowds and the television cameras, with ITV also filming “Dickinson’s Real Deal” . One of the “Royal” lots was an octagonal fabric covered wardrobe with hinged lid cupboard to top which far exceeded its £15-20 estimate, making a hammer price of £1,050.

The Sporting Sale in September saw us sell a collection of tiger skins - with a good Van Ingen and Van Ingen of Mysore skin achieving £1,500.  A large private collection of  fishing tackle did well, its star lot being a Farlow Oak Fly Reservoir in leather outer case at £1,400. In the Selected Antique Sale on the 29th September an interesting 19th Century Chinese export ivory “King George” chess set (illustrated below) sold for £2,600.  Mid November brought us a Single Owner Sale of an eccentric gentleman which featured a 1954 TF MG 1250CC and a Mercedes 560. The highlight of the last sale of the year was a late 17th Century English lantern clock making a hammer price of £22,000 and a fabulous micro mosaic floral spray panel achieving £8,800.

The first sale of 2007 is an Antique and General Sale on the 5th January with a good mixture of furniture, pictures, china etc. The full catalogue is available on line now.