Gregynog Antiques Roadshow

We've come to a quiet corner of Powys

where sheep easily outnumber people.

It seems an unlikely spot to find a house where leading artists,

musicians and politicians were once entertained.

Welcome to the Antiques Roadshow from Gregynog

in the sheep farming landscape of Mid Wales.

From the 1920s to the 1950s the Davies sisters,

Gwen and Margaret, known as Daisy, lived here.

The girls' father had made a huge amount of money

through coal mining in South Wales.

The sisters were among the wealthiest women in Britain

and they had a vision - they wanted to dedicate their lives

and their money to reviving Wales' artistic and national heritage.

Gwen and Daisy were deeply religious and very cultured young women.

Gwen was musical, Daisy artistic, and they decided that this house

was going to be a centre for the arts in Wales.

The sisters spent some of their money

on amassing a fine art collection,

so visitors coming here would see works

by the great impressionist and post-impressionist masters.

Works by Renoir, Cezanne, Monet, Millais.

And they wanted the house to ring with music.

They converted this former billiard room into a music room

and it was here that the sisters met every week

to be part of a choir that was made up of their servants,

the estate workers and people who were willing to

travel from nearby hamlets and the nearest town

which is four miles away.

Gwen sang alto, Daisy second soprano.

Gwen died in 1951 and Daisy, 12 years later,

but their vision lives on.

Their impressive art collection

was bequeathed to the National Gallery of Wales,

though some of it remains here.

And Gregynog was given to the University of Wales

and there continues to be strong emphasis on the arts here.

And 80 years on, there's still a music festival held here every year.

Gwen and Daisy Davies loved their house to be full of music

and people and beautiful things, so I think they'd rather enjoy

seeing what the people of Wales have brought along for our experts today.

And don't forget you can join in at home with our valuation game.

Just press red on your remote control or go to...

..on your smartphone or on your tablet.

Well, cutting hard stone and setting it seamlessly

together like a jigsaw puzzle is a very skilled technique.

Do you know where this was made?

No, no idea.

It belongs to my dad and it's been in the family since about 1958

when it was left to my grandma from a lady called Miss Cummings.

And Miss Cummings was the nanny of my dad and his three brothers

when they were little.

Granny had four boys under five and was in desperate need of some help

and advertised for a nanny.

The only applicant was Miss Cummings,

who was, by then, elderly, chain smoking

and not really what my granddad had in mind.

But let me guess, your mother took her on nonetheless!

My granny said, "She's coming anyway, I need the help",

and she came and she became a massive part of the family,

and she actually died in 1958 at my granny's house.

She was a useless nanny.

I think it had come to her from either an uncle

or a great uncle and the story is that they were farmers

who went out to Australia and they were farming next door

to the gold fields and sold food for the miners,

who paid them in gold dust,

and so they came back as very rich men,

and it's thought that that's where it's come from.

-So, bought with gold dust, effectively.

-Yes, yep.

But nothing to do with Australia or even England.

This was made in Italy,

and there's a great history of this stone inlay - semi precious stones,

lapis lazuli, coloured agates, jaspers, and white chalcedony -

and it was first made in Italy, in Rome,

in workshops in the 16th century.

This is quite a lot later than that.

I would think this is 1880, 1890, maybe even 1900,

by which stage there were very good workshops flourishing in Florence.

Right.

One thing I love about it is the frame,

because this I'm sure is the original frame

-that it was purchased in.

-Right, OK.

And these kind of frames are known as Florentine frames.

Very light, sort of airy piercing and carving and then gilded.

-Beautiful.

-And it's the perfect setting, isn't it,

-for this pietra dura?

-And that translates as?

That translates as "hard stone".

Well, highly prized within your family, obviously,

and if this was to appear at auction,

it would have an estimate of around £800 to £1,000.

Oh, fabulous. Oh, I will email him and tell him.

He'll be delighted.

It's a family piece from my father's side of the family and it was given

to my mum when my brother was born in 1950, my brother John,

but she was told it was actually made for my Taid -

for my granddad, in 1897.

Right.

But that was sort of Lake Vyrnwy area, Llangadfan,

-sort of north of Mid Wales.

-North of Mid Wales...

-CHUCKLING:

-OK, my...

-Quite specific.

Absolutely, I'm glad you can be.

And who is this young, young lady?

That is my youngest, Fern, when she was...

I think she's actually in her Christening dress there.

It was a little photo shoot I did.

Right, well, I look at this and find this incredibly interesting

because of the condition,

and I like it because it's completely untouched,

because you see little child's chairs

or little potties and they've always been

messed around or in bad condition, but this is in marvellous condition.

I think it was a used piece

cos I think it actually got sort of mop lines around it.

Yes, yes.

So, actually, it was a used piece.

I mean, all my grandchildren have sat in it

when they've come to visit.

Presumably... Fern now is also pregnant,

-so probably hers will also sit in here.

-Fantastic.

So, I think it's late 18th century, early 19th century.

It's made of oak and elm. I love this little tray top.

I'm going to lift this up here.

So, that's how the child would sit in the little chair.

This would fold down.

It's got lovely forged iron supports,

a little carrying handle - this is so it could be moved around.

It's so heavy, isn't it?

-It is.

-When you lift it down.

As my husband found out carrying it from the car park this morning.

Well, he looks a strong man to me.

And because of its simplicity and the condition,

to a collector, this is highly sought after,

and I could quite easily see a collector being willing

to pay between £800 and £1,200 for this.

Well, that's nice, but as they always say,

this is never going to get sold.

It's very hard to explain how a watch can feel good in the hand,

but believe me, this feels magnificent.

It's a lovely size,

a lovely weight and it's just a super quality object.

Can I assume that it belonged once

to one of these gentlemen in this picture?

Yes, yes, my great grandfather who's in the centre,

and he was... It was the colliery and he was the manager,

and then he left afterwards and set up on his own,

but the watch was so that he could tell the time

whilst he was underground.

That's obviously his armorial on the back there.

-Yes.

-And it's got, here, his name,

Mr Barnes, and a date of October 1908.

Do you know who made the watch?

I have no idea.

Well, we'll open the cuvette and it's all fully signed there -

JW Benson and then by warrant to Her Majesty the late Queen Victoria.

Now, of course, she died in 1901.

The full address of Ludgate Hill...

And it had to declare the country of origin,

so, just in the corner there, it says Swiss made.

Top of the range Swiss, as you can see,

jewelled to the centre,

beautifully screwed down jewels. It's lovely.

So the date of 1908 that's engraved there is, of course,

the date that it would have been bought,

but, the thing that I haven't shown you is the repetition.

-You move this slide and...

-WATCH CHIMES

I knew you moved something.

And it strikes to the nearest minute.

Now, I did know that

because my grandfather had it after his father,

who had the same name as his father,

and, as a child, I remember sitting on his knee

with the watch and hearing it chime, but I had no idea how to operate it.

I didn't even know it worked.

Well, it's one of those wonderful things with children -

you can hold the slide and say, "blow on it",

and then release it and they think it's magic.

But that is a magic watch.

The price doesn't quite reflect that,

but if it came up for auction,

it's still going to make the best part of £4,000.

Right, I'm amazed. I had no idea.

I didn't even know it worked, so thank you very much.

I'm so excited about this object.

You haven't seen anything like it before. Not live, anyway.

Do you know, I'm used to looking at this

kind of object in a case in a museum.

-In museums, yes.

-Absolutely.

And to suddenly have one put down in front of you

-is just quite staggering.

-Yes, it is, yeah.

What we've got here is an object that's over 400 years old.

That's right.

Firstly, please tell me how you come to own it.

Well, I was fascinated by crossbows when I was a teenager

and I even made one that I tried to shoot rabbits with,

but then, a few years later, when I was an undergraduate

at Cambridge, I happened to see this in an old fashioned junk shop

of a kind that no longer exists, in Tunbridge Wells of all places.

-Right.

-And I was so was fascinated by crossbows,

I mean, I had to buy it, and I bought it for £3,

which was a lot of money to a impecunious student in the 1950s.

OK, well, £3 obviously does...

But it was not in very good condition

and I had to spend a great deal of tender loving care on it

because, at some point, it had obviously been somewhere damp

and the glue holding it had swelled,

so that the pieces of ivory, the inlay, had come out.

So, I did quite a lot of repair work.

Right. Quite, quite incredible.

I mean, firstly, let's talk about it a bit more.

It's actually a sporting crossbow.

Sporting, yes. Not a military one at all.

Yes, we know that it's not a military crossbow

because it is so beautifully decorated.

-That's right.

-Now, you mentioned ivory.

-Yes.

-In fact, it's not ivory, it's bone.

We can see by the fleck in most of the larger pieces

-that that's what it is.

-That's right.

And what we have to appreciate is, and I'm sure you know this,

that in the period in which this was made in, what,

around about 1575, we know that hunting in that period

was a particularly popular pastime.

I mean, even in the period in which firearms were

coming into common usage, these were very, very popular.

-Yes.

-Because they were silent...

They were silent - that is the great thing.

Yeah, and they were reusable, in essence, you know,

you only had to put a bolt in them.

And if we turn it over, we can see that, in fact, actually,

there is a crucial piece missing from it.

Apart from the fact that we have some inlay missing,

-the trigger is actually missing.

-That's right.

So, what we would have had was in fact a long steel trigger

which had an amazing amount of sensitivity, didn't it?

Well, the main trigger was just for, sort of, cocking the mechanism,

and then you had a hair trigger inside,

which you just had to pull,

and that released the thing very delicately, as it were.

Well, what's amazing about it, in fact,

is the originality of all of this.

Everything is intact here.

Yes.

If we look at the decoration, we can see and we have dogs,

which are obviously used in the hunt.

For retrieving the game.

Absolutely, and we have a hare looking backwards in the chase,

and then if we move on a bit, we have a deer just here,

springing through the undergrowth, all beautifully, beautifully inlaid.

-Yes.

-I don't think I mentioned where this came from, did I?

I think this is probably a Southern German one.

Yes, that's what I thought from similar firearms

of the same period with the same kind of decoration.

And we're talking matchlocks of that period.

-Yes, yes.

-Now, let's talk about some value here,

because it's a little bit difficult with this one

-because of the missing parts.

-Right.

And I'm going to say, possibly in this sort of condition,

it's going to be worth, at the moment,

-around about £2,000 to £3,000.

-Right, yes.

Which, let's face it, even that long ago,

-for a £3 investment, it's pretty worthwhile.

-It's quite good!

This is the height of the British Summer Time.

It certainly is, yes.

And your vase knows it's summer.

It does.

I think it's probably known it's summer in our family

since about 1945 to about '48, something like that.

That's when my parents, I think, purchased it,

and it's been in the cabinet ever since,

and my father passed away about three years ago and I inherited it.

He thought it was Coalport.

He used to collect Coalport, and about ten years ago,

we went to the Coalport Museum to see if it actually was Coalport,

and it was quite interesting, because they weren't sure.

And that's where I am now.

So, is it Coalport? Isn't it Coalport? When was it made?

I really know very little about it.

-Well, hopefully I can help a little.

-Right.

Coalport was a good start.

-Right.

-But, had it been Coalport,

I reckon they would have known that.

I mean, the style of vase - it's High Rococo,

absolutely covered in flowers, an extraordinary thing.

This would have first been seen at Meissen in Germany

in the middle of the 18th century.

Classic Rococo and you have vases encrusted with flowers,

also with figures on the top.

This is a potpourri vase - you see it's got reticulations,

so if you fill it with potpourri, the scents and perfumes.

The scent comes out, yes.

It can come out of that.

But it's not a German vase

and the material is the thing that tells us that.

-This is made of bone china.

-Right...

-It's a softer, creamier material,

and it's curiously only made really in the UK.

So, if it's a bone china object,

-it's going to be a British object.

-Right.

If we look underneath this...

I could see nothing.

Yeah, nothing at all. No marks.

-And so, what have we got to go on?

-Yes.

Well, there are actually shape and pattern books for various factories

and this particular shape has been identified

-in the Minton pattern books.

-Gosh.

So, it's made in Staffordshire at the Minton Factory,

who actually made...

The quality of this is actually considerably better

than had it been a Coalport one.

And it's the Rococo Revival in the 1830s,

and so it's a British Rococo Revival.

And then Art Nouveau at the end of the century

is like another but slightly more stylised

revival again, also of Rococo,

so it's one of these episodes in style.

Also, it's one of a pair. Do you have the other?

LAUGHING: No! Unfortunately not.

It happens all the time.

There should be another vase here with a little boy sitting on top.

Of course, it's got a value.

The problem is, tastes do change a great deal,

and we now live in a world where masses of decoration

and elaborate decoration like this is not fashionable.

And now, I would say...

round about £300 at auction.

Really? Well, that's fine, you know.

It's a fraction of what I would have said years ago.

Sure, sure. No, that isn't a problem.

It's a piece that we've got, it looks lovely in our cabinet

and it doesn't get dusty with the glass cabinet closed

and there it is, it's going to stay there.

My father was a prisoner of war in Borneo

for 3 and a half years under the Japanese

and he was one of the lucky ones in that he was an officer.

But, um, they had nothing to do.

They weren't supposed to write or, you know, draw anything,

so, secretly, they used to have to entertain themselves.

But he actually designed this caravan

with all the instructions on how to make it.

And was he a caravaner before the War?

Not as far as I know.

I think his, um...his uncle possibly had a caravan.

Is this him?

Yes, that was him.

I believe that was taken soon after he was made into an officer,

because he went into the army as a gunner

and then, after six months, he was discharged

and then commissioned as an officer and this was all in his 20s.

What he's done here is he's put together

-a little booklet, if you like, about a caravan.

-Yes.

And he's written here, "The object of these plans

"is to produce a cheap, lightweight caravan

"to comply with my idea of the minimum comforts required

"on an average GB caravan holiday."

Do you think he ever planned to have this published?

Probably not.

It may be that if he hadn't got married

almost as soon as he got back from the War

that he might have actually built it and gone trailing round GB.

But the one thing which I regret very much

is that he never actually talked about his experience.

So many men didn't, you see,

but it's drawn and written on backs of envelopes

and little scraps of paper.

Yes, well, that's all they could get.

The envelopes were what they had from the family.

Um, they used to exchange cigarettes for paper

from, you know, other inmates and my dad didn't smoke,

so he would give his cigarettes away and get paper instead.

Now, why would he have done it, do you think?

Purely because I think that he had to do something to keep his sanity,

because they had very tough times, they were very strictly controlled

as to what they were supposed to do and they weren't supposed to do,

and this sort of thing was done in the evenings, at dusk,

and they used to have lookouts

that would tell them if the guards were coming.

In one of his bits of paperwork, there's a record of his weight

and, when I knew him, he was about 16 stone,

even though he was only five foot six.

But his weight went down to about six and a half, seven stone.

And, as I say, as an officer, he was one of the lucky ones.

So you can imagine what a terrible time they had.

But I-I never had the chance to talk to him about it.

Unfortunately he died suddenly, aged 53,

and they didn't talk about it and I didn't know

until I looked into all of this about four or five years ago.

Do you know, he's gone into such incredible detail.

Look at this!

This shows the inside of the caravan - Calor Gas,

even the beds, look, he's got,

the cupboard with plates, cups and saucers, breadbin.

I don't think there's anything that he's forgotten.

-He's not missed a thing, has he, actually?

-No.

You know, this is the sort of book

that, really, I'd love to see published as a DIY manual,

how to build a caravan.

Yes, and I'd like to think that my family, at one stage,

might even build it.

I have a very practical middle son

and it would be lovely to see if the manual worked.

Well, he's certainly given every possible instruction

you could need to build a caravan.

He's even gone into costings, look.

I mean, if you look here, this is the final page,

and tells you how much it's going to cost to build

and it comes to £45 and 18 shillings.

-Yes, yeah.

-Now, how about that.

I wonder what that would cost to build today.

I think there'd be some inflation to go on that, yes, yeah.

I think there would. Now what's it worth, as a...

as a wonderful little DIY manual on how to build a caravan? Um...

I-I suspect it would be worth something in the region

of £150 to £200, something in that order.

Well, I wasn't really interested in the value, obviously.

To me, it's got tremendous sentimental value

and maybe, one day, the actual caravan would be worth thousands.

THEY CHUCKLE

-Hello.

-Hello.

So, if anyone's getting a prize for the most difficult thing

to bring to the Antiques Roadshow, it's you.

Look. But, first of all, let's have introductions. What's his name?

-His name is Hardwick.

-Hardwick.

Yes, and I inherited him two years ago from my friend's mum, Mary,

who's passed away now.

And where was Hardwick when he was at home?

Well, we were always brought up with bulldogs

and my mum used to do bed and breakfast

and we used to have guests that used to come every year

and they sent my mother a photograph of Hardwick

sitting in a window of an antique shop, we think somewhere in Kent.

So my mum just said,

"I don't care what he costs, here's a cheque, go and buy him".

So he used to have pride of place underneath the stairs.

So, yeah. So, I mean, I think he's the ugliest thing I've ever seen

in my life but Jeanette thinks he's marvellous.

Oh, yes.

Well, he's obviously 1970s, Italian,

and he's certainly got a very good look about him.

I mean, my... I think my Russian Black Terrier

would have a bit of a fit about him.

I mean, he's very similar to an Italian ceramic firm called Ronzan,

that made lots of big animals, and he does have that look

but he's not marked, so I think he's just Ronzan style.

And very fashionable in America.

-I mean, it's a sort of decorator's piece.

-Yes.

And, you know, we're talking, in terms of value,

-we're not talking a lot.

-No.

We're saying, you know, sentimental value for you, and you love him.

Oh, God, yeah.

But I think we're talking £80 to £150. But...hey!

-We've had a lovely time.

-He's a great topic...

He's a great topic of conversation, I'll give him that!

THEY LAUGH

Well, here we are in the middle of Wales

and you've turned up with a pen-and-ink drawing

of the head of Christ and, on the back, it's got,

"Design for stained-glass window, Alabama."

-So how come?

-Yes.

It's by John Petts and, in 1963,

the 16th Baptist church in Alabama, Birmingham, was bombed

and he heard about it so he collected money

from the people of Wales to build a stained-glass window in the church.

So the maximum they could donate was half a crown,

because he wanted the people of Wales to own it,

rather than some benefactor coming in and taking the glory as such.

That's amazing and-and he managed to raise all that money?

-He did, yes.

-How did he do it?

Did he advertise it through the papers, or...?

Yeah, one of the editors of the Western Mail was involved,

and they advertised it and they had pictures of children in Tiger Bay,

which is quite a strong African Caribbean community,

and they were queuing up to give their half a crown

-towards the Alabama window.

-That's amazing, absolutely amazing.

And, of course, that bombing in 1963,

there were four children killed, weren't there?

Yes, yes.

-I think that the Ku Klux Klan were responsible for it.

-Yes.

And I think because John Petts had children of his own,

that is why he decided to do this.

So this must have been a design

for the Christ on this stained-glass window.

Yes, yes. Yes.

And was it a black Christ?

It was a black Christ, yeah, which was quite controversial, as well,

in Birmingham, Alabama, considering the Klan bombed the church as well.

Is it known as the Wales Window?

It's known as the Wales or the Welsh Window, yes.

And I see also it's signed down here,

and dated 1964, cos that's when the window was completed, wasn't it?

-Yes.

-And it's pen and ink. Now where did you get it from?

-Have you always had it?

-No, I got it from a car-boot sale.

-A car boot?

-Sorry, sorry.

Disgraceful. How long ago did you get it?

Um, round about six months ago, I think. Yes.

Six months ago. And what did you pay for it?

-A pound.

-£1.

I didn't haggle any less, now, I kept it as a pound, yeah.

So did you know what you were buying when you were at the car boot?

Absolutely not, no.

I've got a strong interest in art

and I could see that it was very well done

but I had no idea, no. None at all.

I just knew it was a good drawing.

I mean, John Petts was born 1914 and died in 1991.

-He was born in London but he really is a Welsh artist.

-Yes, yes.

And really known within the Welsh community, I think,

-doing stained glass.

-Yes.

-And engravings.

-Yes, yeah.

So here we have a pen-and-ink drawing

for this really iconic monument

and I think that if I think about the whole reason it was done

and it's important, and it's one of his most important works,

I'm going to put on that between £800 and £1200.

SHE LAUGHS Brilliant, thank you!

That's good for a pound.

Well, I seriously think people in America would be interested

to own one of the original drawings for that.

I know - it's important so...

Well, what a fantastic thing to have been brought in today.

Thank you very much, thank you.

Well, I spotted you in the queue

with this very weathered piece of wood

and it weighs a ton,

so how does this fit into your household?

Well, it was known to us as "Grandad's African cudgel",

and he used to keep it by the front door

and then, when it came to my mum, she used to keep it by her bed.

And then we've kept it by the front door until I painted the hall

and now it's just sort of come back out for today.

OK, well, what a deterrent it is, cos it's a serious-looking club.

Now, from Africa - any family sort of explorers or...?

I know nothing about it. It's always just been "Grandad's".

Well, Africa is known for its war clubs but they are not like this.

Oh, right.

And, I tell you, the weight alone of this

gave me a clue to where it was from,

because it's almost like it was made of iron.

You know, it's a shame that on telly you can't feel the weight,

but I can and this is almost certainly from the kingdom of Tonga.

-Really?

-So it's miles from Africa.

And there's a particular tree called the Toa tree

that gives this rock-hard wood that, of course,

the tribes would use as a good carving material,

to turn it into a practical war club,

so this was meant for tribal war.

This one is carved with repeated triangles down to a little ring,

which again is very typically Tongan,

and they're actually called akau ta.

Akau ta.

Yeah, that's the popular name for this type of club.

Artefacts like this are very difficult to date

and, you know, these were made obviously

from the 18th century, if not earlier.

So I'm going to look at the patina, the wear and tear that it has,

and imagine this could be as early as the late 18th,

perhaps early 19th century.

But it's hard to prove.

So, there's a huge following for collectors of Polynesian clubs

and, with this colour and patina, I would have no doubt

that at auction it would carry an estimate of between £800 and £1,200.

Right. Have to change its name now to "Grandad's Tongan cudgel".

-Tongan club.

-Tongan club. It's a bit of a mouthful.

Oh, thank you. That's really interesting.

We're doing our Rogues' Gallery a little bit differently this week.

We have here four watches, but THREE of them are fake

and only ONE is genuine - the thing is, which is which?

Richard Price, our clocks and watches expert,

has brought these watches along

and he says that the number of fakes in the market

is an increasing problem for watch collectors.

So can you spot the one genuine watch and the three fakes?

They all look fabulous.

Richard is going to give you some clues.

Watch number one is a beautiful-looking Master Calendar

watch by Jaeger-LeCoultre, or is it?

It looks slightly retro and convincing

but was a model like this ever made by this company?

Number two, and it's a glittering name, Cartier.

It's apparently an all-gold Santos model,

and if it's right, it retails for something well in excess of £20,000.

Are the diamonds real and is this example worth anything?

Our third watch, a Rolex GMT-Master II, looking like the real deal.

A great sports watch, but are you convinced by this example?

And finally, the maker of this last watch is Panerai, with

an example in a titanium case and the reverse with a visible movement.

But does the mechanism bear the quality of the example

in the catalogue?

So, Richard, THREE fakes?

Is that a sign of quite how many fakes there are out in the market?

There are a massive number of fakes.

Now, you might be tempted to think that if they look so realistic

and so much like the real thing, what does it matter?

But, of course, you know, if you're a collector or watches

or if you're going to be inheriting a watch, you need to have the

real thing, because the fakes in the future will have almost no value.

Absolutely, and this is what we're going to try and get over,

as to how good the copies are now.

Look at the packaging, for example. I mean, that's stunning, isn't it?

The packaging is absolutely superb.

Probably most of the packaging is originally made

in the Far East anyway and comes into Europe.

I mean, look at the wood, for instance, of this Panerai box.

The leather on the Cartier box might not be quite up to scratch.

But that's actual leather, is it?

Well, it's not, but it's still pretty nice.

I'm giving you a clue already, which I shouldn't be doing!

Oh, OK. No, no, no, I'd already made my mind up!

I won't be swayed.

But aren't they clever? The packaging...

And they all, of course, underneath, have the guarantee cards

and the certificates and everything like that.

When I was looking at these, I mean, I found it very hard not to

be swayed by quite how glorious and gorgeous the packaging was.

One thing I did notice with the Rolex

-is that written inside is "Rolex".

-Yep, yep.

Which you'd think would be a very expensive process if you were going to make a fake.

-You would've thought so.

-So I assumed...

-Yep.

..that that was a genuine one, even though I know

Rolexes are faked massively and that all the others are the fakes.

Rolexes are massively faked, mainly the sports watches.

So this is a GMT-Master II - this is faked oh, so, so well.

And about the size of half a millimetre is a laser-etched crown

inside the glass. The fakers have that down to a fine art as well.

Oh, my goodness, so, what... So how can you tell?

The only way you can tell is by removing the back,

and instead of having a genuine Rolex movement,

they're using an ETA, which is part of the Swatch Group.

So that's a fake. This is a fake, because this is...

-No, I didn't say that.

-Oh!

-LAUGHTER

I was just saying that the copies of these are so good.

I'm going to wait for your decision later.

You're just playing with me, aren't you?

But, I mean, if someone wanted to buy a watch -

an expensive watch, this kind of expensive watch -

how could they be sure that they weren't buying a fake and that they

were in fact buying a collectible watch, an antique of the future?

I would always suggest, if you're buying a new watch,

that you go to a retail jeweller of repute who has an agency

for whatever brand you want to buy.

And the thing absolutely to avoid, and I had somebody earlier today

who arrived with a Rolex and he said he'd taken it

in exchange for a bad debt, you want to avoid that sort of thing, because

that is the ultimate scam, you could be passed off with anything.

So go to a decent jeweller, who will give you a proper receipt

and a proper certificate,

and then if there's any query at any stage, you can back it.

And I guess the price is a bit of a giveaway

because the price of the fakes or the price

they are offered at is a fraction of the real thing, isn't it?

It is if you can buy them at source,

but again, they are making their way into the retail market.

So then they'll be selling at, what, the full value?

They will be selling it at pretty much full value or saying,

"This would normally be £7,000, but to you, I can do it for five."

Gosh.

-Not that funny if you've bought one, however!

-Exactly.

I challenge you to work out which is which.

Well, come on then, I thought this was a bit of a double bluff,

because I know these are faked so much and you've talked to me about this before.

I assumed this was the genuine one and that these three are the fakes.

I hate to say it...

-but you're right!

-Ohh!

CHEERING

-I wanted to pull the double bluff specially.

-Oh!

But that's why, that's the only reason,

because I know you've seen so many fake Rolexes. So...

..how can you tell that these are not genuine, then?

Well, this in real life would be well in excess of £20,000.

Wow!

It is only a quartz movement,

but the real Cartier's only a quartz as well.

The fact is that the diamonds just simply aren't diamonds,

the quality of the case isn't there.

What about this one, the Jaeger-LeCoultre?

Jaeger don't make a watch that looks like that.

They have a power reserve where those two sectors are and the

two windows are at the nine and the three o'clock,

so it looks retro and they made something like that 20 years ago

but it's not available now.

What about this? Amazing with all the packaging

and the wooden box and the little screwdriver here.

This is a very, very collectible brand.

Panerai have devoted followers who will only buy this particular brand.

This particular one is in a titanium case

and if I can just show you the movement -

I don't know whether you had a look at the back, you probably didn't -

it is very, very clever.

And compared, if you get the catalogue...

There we are, that is that watch, but if you look at it there,

you can just see it's not quite as good as the real thing.

Right, well, there you are, if you want to make sure that

you are buying a genuine watch as opposed to one of these

admittedly very clever but ultimately cheap knock-off watches,

have a look at our website...

So you must have been a very stylish bride indeed in 1972,

wearing this Ossie Clark dress.

Tell me what made you choose which,

at the time, must have been quite an unusual choice of dress.

Well, I went shopping with my mother and my sister to buy a dress

and I was living in Manchester at the time. And we went into a

very formal bridal shop, and when I went to hold the dress, to look at

one, the lady in the shop said, "You can just touch the price tickets."

So I thought, "I'm not buying anything here,"

so we walked out and went into a tiny little boutique

just off St Ann's Square, and this was the only white dress

in the shop, but when I saw it, I just fell in love with it.

And were you aware of Ossie Clark at the time?

Were you a fan of his particularly?

No, I wasn't, not at all, so it was only much later that I -

when he died, in fact - that I discovered that he was

a significant figure and I realised how very special my dress was.

And, amazingly, you actually still have the dress.

I understand you've brought a photograph of you wearing it - can we have a look at that?

Yes, certainly. This is my wedding scrapbook and there are the photos.

-There you are wearing it.

-Yes.

I have to say, this demonstrates, really, that the dress really does,

does benefit from being worn rather than being shown on the dummy.

-Yes.

-How old were you at the time?

-I was just 21.

-You look very young indeed.

Yes. We've just celebrated our Ruby wedding anniversary.

Congratulations, fantastic. Well, Ossie Clark, obviously,

he's a very significant figure in the history of 20th-century fashion.

I think he was born in 1942 and he was married to Celia Birtwell,

a very famous designer, and she produced very vibrant prints

for a lot of his dresses which are incredibly popular now.

This obviously is slightly more unusual in the fact

that it's a plain white one and it is decorated with the hearts here.

And also, we've got these lovely little button sleeves

and on the shoulder there and also on the sleeve ends.

Harking back to the 1930s in a way, style-wise,

with the crepe dress which has a tie at the back.

But, you know, he is a figure that in recent years has become

incredibly desirable, and Ossie Clark is, you know, he is THE name,

he's up there with Mary Quant and Biba and so on.

You know, he's as good as them.

I think this would be a very desirable piece indeed,

and I think there are an awful lot of brides to be at the moment

who would give their eye teeth to have an Ossie Clark wedding dress.

So I could see somebody quite easily paying

somewhere in the region of £300 to £400 for it.

Goodness me, goodness me. I think it was £20 at the time.

-Was it?

-That's quite an increase in value, isn't it?

-No, it's brilliant.

-Goodness.

Now, one of my great memories is travelling by train from Perth

to Kalgoorlie and on to Sydney,

but I'm glad to say when I did it,

we didn't have a crash, which clearly is what has happened here.

Now, this is an interesting group of photographs,

obviously of some, I have to say, minor disaster, from the fact

-that everybody's walking around and smiling.

-Yeah.

-But the interesting thing is it's connected with a royal visit, isn't it?

-Yes, that's right.

I've got here a programme for the Royal Train

conveying His Royal Highness The Prince of Wales and his suite

-from Perth to Kalgoorlie in July 1920.

-Yeah.

So where do you fit in?

My great-grandfather, John Faulkner Tomlinson,

had been in the railways for a very long time.

He first started off here then moved across to Australia.

In 1923, he became secretary of the railways, but he had a long history

within the Western Australian railway industry.

-So he was a very important person in that state?

-Yeah, that's right.

-Right.

-And he was involved in a lot of rail events.

Such as this.

Such as this, as well as other press tours and things like that.

I'll tell you a bit about the royal visit.

Since the first one, I think, in the 1860s, there have been

over 50 royal visits to Australia.

Edward, Prince of Wales, went as the emissary of George V

in April 1920 to Australia,

and the purpose of that mission was very simple.

He travelled all over Australia.

-It was to thank Australia for doing so much in the First World War.

-Oh!

It was a deliberate attempt to say, "We're very grateful, thank you."

And so this rather exciting event was only part of a much wider trip,

and I'm not quite sure what happened, but he was travelling

to Bridgetown and obviously the train simply came off the track.

Now, that sounds very simple and a big disaster,

but actually the most extraordinary thing is you can

see in the photographs the carriage on its side.

It obviously happened fairly slowly, and so,

apart from everybody falling over, no-one seems to have been hurt.

We see the Prince of Wales -

here he is looking very, very jolly indeed with a cap and a suit -

and behind him is Lord Louis Mountbatten,

who came with him on that journey.

And to show that there was a light side of it, apparently,

when the train had fallen over, Edward, Prince of Wales, was

seen climbing out of his carriage still clutching his cocktail shaker.

No!

And the Australians thought this was great, and from this moment on,

-apparently, he was known as the "Digger Prince".

-Yeah, well...

-So good comes out of a disaster.

-Yes.

I think also I should just remind us that Edward, of course,

later became, or didn't become, Edward VIII.

You know, he was the key figure in this and that's why

he went as the royal emissary, because he was the Prince of Wales,

and he was destined to be King, but we all know history changed.

Erm, it's quite difficult to value.

I mean, I think I'm going to put something like

£500, £1,000 as an archive, because it tells an extraordinary story.

-Well, thank you so much.

-Thank you very much.

-Wow!

Forget Turner.

Forget van Gogh, forget Picasso, forget all the others.

For me, it has to be the jewel in the crown of Gregynog -

is the Gregynog Press, and you're the librarian of the Gregynog Press.

-It was a private press started in 1922.

-Mm-hmm.

The Misses Davies bought the best printer in they could possibly

find and the best artists to work here on their own private press.

They were very much into the arts and crafts movement, but they also

had a very, very strong aesthetic sense and they wanted to raise

people's aesthetic awareness. And this was one of the ways in which

they tried to do this, to sort of make available these wonderful books

in which the quality of the printing and the quality of the illustrations

was really the key, and also, of course, the quality of the bindings.

Well, here we start off with David Jones

and this wonderful wood engraving here, with the Crucifixion,

-with the mourners, absolutely wonderful.

-It is beautiful, yes.

-This is 1927.

-I think so, yes, yes.

-This is the book of the Preacher.

-The Preacher, yes.

-In Welsh.

Llyfr y pregethwr.

And can you recite...?

"Gwagedd o wagedd medd y Pregeth-wr."

So that's "Vanity of vanities..."

-"..Yw'r cwbl." Yes.

-"..saith the preacher."

That's it, yeah.

And you see the wonderful bindings they put on, this is

beautiful blue morocco - that's why we're handling these with gloves,

of course - that were actually done here, by bookbinders here.

Yes, indeed. Yes, indeed they were.

It started in 1922 and the press went on,

and I think its greatest period was in the 1930s.

Indeed, yes, yes, when we had Agnes Miller Parker.

Agnes Miller Parker, of course, who comes here,

and this is the book of Aesop.

Yes, the fables of Aesop, from Paxton's translation,

and when you think, it's just scratching on wood, basically.

It's scratching on wood, but how... But you can see the sort of

relationship between these two of the common and foolish woman.

"Aesop reherceth us to such a fable," and this is the struggle

-between the man and the woman here, by Agnes Miller Parker, yes.

-Yes.

With the most beautiful binding on it, again.

-Yes, that's a lovely binding, isn't it? It's really lovely, yes.

-It's beautiful.

And, of course, who was also working at the same time,

and you have him there, this lovely binding here,

and it's an Art Deco binding, you'd call it, isn't it?

It is, yes, and this was designed by Blair Hughes-Stanton.

-It was Blair Hughes-Stanton, who was working with her at the same time.

-Indeed, yes.

-And can we have a look at his illustrations?

-Yes, yes.

This is on Japanese vellum.

Yes, and this is The Lamentations of Jeremiah.

And is this Jeremiah, do you think, in Chapter II?

I think it is Lamenting, yeah.

Lamenting. Can we turn it? Oh, yes, and look at that!

-That is really, really lovely.

-These incredible illustrations -

-they really are quite incredible, aren't they?

-They're wonderful, yes.

-And they're so modern.

-Yes, yes, yes.

-Almost modern now, really, aren't they?

-Yeah, yeah.

-But they reached the highest pitch of private presses.

-Yes, yes.

The private press movement started in the 18th century

and, really, right the way through, you don't see anything as good

or as fine as this. Then, come the war, the Gregynog Press stopped.

Stopped, yes. All the people who were working there at the time...

And by this time, Hughes-Stanton and Agnes and her husband,

William McCance, had all moved on, but they were all called up.

We have to mention prices - I know it's totally

irrelevant in your case, but an ordinary copy, one without

a decent binding on,

-would fetch hundreds and hundreds of pounds.

-Mm, mm.

But the special ones, the limited, limited editions...

-There were only 15 or 20 done.

-15 or 20, exactly.

..would be fetching probably ten times the price of ordinary ones.

This is wonderful. Thank you. We could go on all day, I feel.

So, out of this rather unpromising box, came this.

-Yes.

-How?

I was amazed too, because Mr Burgess was a very distant relation

of my father's, and I received a letter

from his solicitor saying that he was going into a care home and

there were a number of items which were going to come to me eventually,

but would I collect them now as the house was going to be sold.

So I went down to his cottage in Cornwall,

collected a number of portraits, a few odds and ends, and that,

as you say, unpromising-looking box.

And astonished when I got home and opened up the box to find this.

Because this is what came out of it.

Now, to some eyes, people would think this is rather a dull-looking exterior, and there...

Is the amazing inside, yes.

Isn't it a...? It's a joy just to open that up.

Yeah, and it's in such lovely condition.

It's in fabulous condition.

The material is lacquer on wood, but what...

Look at that dazzling gold design, more Chinese landscapes,

figures out of doors, and each has this little

roundel in the middle which contains a European coat of arms.

-Have you done any research on that?

-No.

No, I mean, I thought that was curious because it didn't seem to

tie in with the Oriental look of the rest of it.

Well, the idea was that, if you wanted a lacquer games box,

you could go for the sort of premium quality by having your coat of arms

inserted into the decoration as well.

And so this is rather a good example of a games box.

Now let's just see how many of these little boxes we can take out.

The central box actually appears to contain an 18th-century card,

or the remnants of.

Yes. And are they hand-painted, do you think?

-Printed. Hand-printed.

-Hand-printed.

-But we don't have all 52.

-No.

Just a few, but those, I would say -

I'm not a card specialist, so I can't be absolutely sure -

but they appear to be potentially contemporary with the box.

Now, this is... It starts getting interesting.

On this side, we have a little stack of six trays.

More landscape.

Another landscape.

Aha!

-Yes.

-The queen and the jack,

the queen on her own,

the queen with a king,

and then this turbaned figure saying "Game".

Right, let's see what the other stack... Another six trays.

A landscape, and now...

..eight of diamonds...

..nine of diamonds,

a very saucy-looking jack...

..a king, and the ace.

Now, the thing that I find so wonderful about this is that

here you have something commissioned in London, it went through

the East India Company, with the gentleman who ordered this saying,

"I want my coat of arms to be on each and every single cover of the boxes."

And it came back probably two years after it was commissioned

and I think he must have been absolutely thrilled with the result.

But the icing, if one can say this, the icing on the cake is

in these odd-shaped corner boxes - a nice little bit of Cantonese ivory.

-Yes.

-In fact, it's a box in its own special well with a tray.

Beautifully put together, aren't they?

And inside the tray, stacks of mother-of-pearl gaming counters.

-Yes.

-And the gorgeous detail here is

that each and every one of these gaming counters...

Has the crest.

-..has the coat of arms.

-Yes, extraordinary.

Do you know how many counters there are?

Oh, it's something like 60, I think.

-Now, shall we start by saying the counters represent money, of course, don't they?

-Yes, yes.

In any game, the counters would represent money.

-In the Georgian period, each counter might have been sixpence.

-Yes.

For a gentleman playing cards.

They would count those up at the end and work out who...

Well, today, each counter would probably sell on the open market

-for somewhere in the region of £25, £35.

-Really?

You've got 60.

Yes, plus. 60-odd.

-Where are we? 60 times, let's say, 30...

-Yes.

-..1,800?

-That's just the counters?

-That's £1,800 for the counters.

Right.

I'm going to put a value on the whole thing

of somewhere between £5,000 and £8,000.

Really? Gosh.

That's a remarkable gift which I wasn't expecting, isn't it?

Take the box...or the money.

You like it!

Welsh passion and emotion

in the form of two spoons and a sugar tongs.

How far back does that love go in your family?

Well, these two belonged to my great-great-grandmothers, one on my

grandfather's side and the other on my grandmother's side.

How wonderful, because this is a very ancient Welsh tradition of carving love tokens,

where a potential male suitor would carve one of these for his maiden.

And as long as it was good enough, and she thought the work was

good enough, she may accept him to be her husband.

So these are very powerful things

and they take in a lot of Welsh folklore.

I think the earliest known dated Welsh love spoon is 1667,

so if I can just look at the spoon on the right first,

this is made of a nice vernacular wood, it's apple wood,

and you can see that there's a pair of keys around a keyhole.

This represents, really, domestic security,

the idea of sort of unlocking the love of your heart.

So, where was it carved, because you are from where?

Oh, I'm from this area,

-but my father's from sort of near Caernarfon.

-Right.

-And so that's where these are from.

-I'm glad you said that,

because this is probably around mid-19th century, from Caernarvonshire.

-Very, very typical of their work...

-Is it?

-..as is this one,

and this is known as a dolphin spoon because of the obvious fluidity

and dolphin-like sort of scroll of the stem.

And this one, I think, is sycamore,

so again just locally available wood, but what really

caught my eye was the sugar tong.

-Now, this carries your family name.

-Yeah.

-So Mrs Hughes was your great-great-grandmother?

-Yes.

Well, I mean, that's fantastic to have that continuity.

This one's made of cherry wood, and on the other side, "November 1880".

So, presumably, she was being sort of courted,

for want of a better word, at that time.

Well, they're just humble carvings

but they're very powerful with it, and I think there'd be very

keen collectors after these, and I think if they went to auction, the

three together would be worth around

£1,000 or £1,200 for the three.

That's very impressive.

Sapphire and diamond three-stone ring -

is it an old family ring, or what's the story behind it?

No. It was a gift from my husband, surprise, lovely surprise.

How many years ago was that?

Eight years ago, something like that.

The sapphire and the diamonds look as if

they might have come from perhaps various sources.

Do you know what the story was behind the sapphire?

My husband bought the sapphire separately.

He has a very good friend who's a stone dealer

and he bought the stone off him.

The diamonds are not modern cut, the diamonds were probably

cut in around about 1900, but the main body of this ring is

quite clearly the sapphire in the centre.

Erm, I ought to say this - in the world of gemstones, you don't just

trade a sapphire and diamond ring, you don't just sell it,

you have to go through a very set procedure.

First of all, I look at this wonderful, warm,

velvety-blue colour, and my immediate reaction when

I see that is to ask myself, "Well, where did those lovely, warm,

"velvety-blue sapphires come from?"

And there are two sources - Ceylon and Kashmir.

Now, Ceylon sapphires are very beautiful, they're like this,

but they're not quite as significant as the Kashmir ones.

The only way that I can establish categorically

whether it is Kashmir is to send it off to a laboratory and then they

can tell me categorically, first of all, that it is a Kashmir sapphire,

and I have to tell you, Kashmir sapphires are the best in the world.

And also very important that it's natural colour,

because you probably have heard these days, gems can be treated,

they can improve them, they can enhance them, they can

heat them, they can make them look better than they actually are.

Now, the thing about the sapphire in the middle of your three-stone

ring is when I look at it, I don't think it's a new stone.

I think it's an old stone,

and it's the old gems that are the ones that everybody wants.

Because they have a pedigree, you know, the old stones that

come from the old mines and Kashmir, they don't exist any more.

Actually, Kashmir sapphires are so rare, so important, because you

can't get them any more except in old rings and this sort of thing.

-Yes.

-Right.

You've got the sapphire, you've got the diamonds,

it's been beautifully set in a classic three-stone ring.

Let's move on to the potential price.

£20,000.

CROWD GASPS Oh, really? Gosh!

Wow!

Thank you.

-You're welcome.

-That's really made my day.

-What do you think it's done for me?

-LAUGHTER

Thank you!

Those prints that Clive Farahar was looking at earlier on,

they were printed on this wonderful printing press set up

here at Gregynog by the Davies sisters.

They printed all kinds of material here.

It was all part of their vision of reviving Welsh national heritage and Welsh culture.

It's a beautiful thing, isn't it?

Great to see something brought along here today that was actually

printed on this press.

From Gregynog and the whole Antiques Roadshow team, bye-bye.