Plaque

A group of 32 ancient gold ornaments have been returned to China following claims they had been illegally removed.

This large Burmantofts faience plaque sold for £7000 at 1818 Auctions of Milnthorpe, Cumbria. The vendor, who bought it at a car boot sale for £20, was in the room to watch bidding surge way beyond a £400-600 estimate.

Discovered in a pile of objects waiting to be tipped at a routine house clearance, a pair of large ceramic plaques will be offered at Gary Don in Leeds this week.

A Derby porcelain plaque and two Japanese plates have been returned by Surrey Police to two stately homes after they were recognised from an alert in Antiques Trade Gazette

Estimated at just £200-300, a set of four early 20th century Chinese famille rose porcelain plaques depicting the four seasons in mountainous settings were bought by a phone bidder from Shanghai for £420,000 at Charterhouse of Sherborne in Dorset.

It was the most important consignment of work by the Rhead family to come onto the market in years. But would the respect in which the remarkable dynasty of potters are held translate into remarkable prices?

English porcelain birth tablets are unique to Lowestoft – and one of many pieces that give the factory’s wares such a profound sense of time and place.

Size, quality, condition and subject matter are the ingredients by which Berlin porcelain plaques are judged.

Abstinence was a ceremonial requirement prior to worshipping the ancestors, the heavens or other deities in the Qing court.

This 19th century ceramic plaque painted with two duellists in sepia forms part of the collection of the late Bernard Popland, a former championship fencer.

A medieval Nottingham alabaster plaque prised away from a London church has been recovered after the appeal in ATG.

HAMPSHIRE auctioneers Jacobs & Hunt of Petersfield achieved a new house record when they sold this 17th century Italian specimen marble plaque for £37,000 last month.

This enigmatic, 7in (18cm) high, early 18th century delftware plaque featured in Sotheby’s November 21 sale at Bond Street where it fetched a mid-estimate £26,000, selling to London dealer Jonathan Horne.

THE engaging subject and large size of this 16 x 13in (41 x 33cm) Berlin-style porcelain plaque, right, helped it to the top slot at the January 18 sale held by Philip Laney (15% buyer’s premium) at the Malvern Auction Centre.

THE V&A has appealed for help from the art and antiques world in tracing the eight bronze plaques thought to be worth a total of £450,000 stolen in the third raid on the museum in three months.

COMPETING against the likes of Carlton Ware and Crown Ducal for market share, cheerful mass-produced ceramics were what the prolific Fieldings Crown Devon factory did best. The best of the second best, if you like.

THE most topical entry in Clevedon Salerooms (15% buyer's premium) large 1200-lot outing on June 17-18 was a collection of Olympics memorabilia. Entered by descendants of the 1908 gold medal winning water polo player Thomas H. Thould, the group fetched £3300.

THE ups and, more depressingly, the downs of the market this year make the results of a steady day’s selling of material put together by Nigel Papworth at Diamond Mills’ (11.75% buyer's premium) Felixstowe rooms at the end of June look positively encouraging.

IT’S hard to say whether modern studio potters find the Della Robbia story inspiring or depressing. Established by Harold Rathbone and Conrad Dressler in Birkenhead in 1894, in its 12-year operation the factory became a key part of the Arts and Crafts movement but also went broke.

THE sale on August 16 was the first time Bonhams, Honiton (17.5% buyer’s premium) had held a specialist collectors’ sale without cigarette and postcards after the decision was made to sell these at New Bond Street. With the sale now focused firmly on Goss and crested china, pot lids, Prattware and commemorative ceramics, lots of new buyers flooded in making the sale a big success.