Kirby Hall 2 Antiques Roadshow

Today, the Roadshow makes a return visit

to Kirby Hall in Northamptonshire.

By the 16th century, when Kirby Hall was built,

it was regarded as one of the finest,

most chic houses in all of England.

Sadly now though, most of it is a ruin.

That part there has no roof.

That corner there has been partially restored.

By the mid-1800s, the family that lived here had packed up and gone,

and the only person that lived in it was a shepherd and his flock.

WOODWIND INSTRUMENTAL

But like the valuables we see brought to the Roadshow,

you only need to look a little closer

and a place like this soon starts to breathe, come to life.

-STRING INSTRUMENTAL

-This is the Long Gallery.

It was once a beautiful, long corridor filled with paintings

and wall hangings and the Hatton family,

who owned Kirby Hall for most of its history,

would stroll up and down here

if it was too rainy or cold outside.

A kind of luxurious exercise track.

Though I doubt anyone broke into a sweat.

Some parts of the house have been partially restored by English Heritage,

meaning it's a little bit easier to imagine what went on here.

Visitors would be met here by the owner in the Great Hall,

while musicians played up in the minstrels gallery.

And with its high walls and ornate ceiling,

it was room designed to impress.

And give guests a crick in their necks.

King James I of England was so impressed,

he stayed at Kirby Hall four times, no less.

He would greet his visitors here in the Great Withdrawing Room

under a starry white canopy,

surrounded by gold and silver cushions.

You have to imagine it.

And special guests like the King

were invited to take a tour of the gardens,

which were a big status symbol.

They would slowly perambulate,

discussing important matters of state, fashion, court gossip,

and stop occasionally and admire the statues and the exotic plants,

which were gathered from across the globe.

Today the garden is open to our own special guests,

who are here to admire and discuss antiques,

as Kirby Hall plays host to the Antiques Roadshow.

And if you want to get involved with the discussions,

why not play along with our valuation game?

Press the red button on your remote and test your antiques knowledge.

Standing with her hand on her hip like this, I get the impression

that this woman is trying to look distinctly saucy, don't you?

Yes, definitely.

Yes, she came from, as far as we know,

from Yates's Wine Lodge in Leicester, from the owner.

-Which is like, what, a vintners, or a wine bar?

-Yes, it is.

Yes, it was a wine bar,

but it was very well known in Leicester in those days,

in the 1950s and it was given to my grandfather

as part of a payment for a debt that the owner owed my grandfather

and then in the 1980s when he died, he passed it on to my father.

So, the question is was the debt worth it?

It's signed at the bottom right, Adolphe Piot.

Piot was a reasonably prominent late 19th century French artist,

more in the academic tradition than the impressionist counterparts

who were working in the late 19th century.

But the question is, is it an original?

Because he is much copied and I would hate to think that it isn't.

I mean, have you speculated on the quality of the picture?

No, not really. I'm not really very well up in art.

No, I just know what I was told about it

and it was just passed to me when my father died.

Well, she's in sort of traditional Italian garb,

-isn't she, really, I suppose?

-Yes.

I mean, she doesn't really look particularly French.

She looks deliberately exotic. I love those earrings.

And when one is trying to determine whether a picture is an original

or a copy, very often the thing to do

is look deep into the paint surface.

Try and find out if the glazes, the layers of paint have been worked up.

I've been looking at that hand there

-and I have to say, it's quite encouraging.

-Right.

I mean, as an artist he's not the greatest of painters

but he does have a way with flesh.

I can imagine this is just the sort of woman that would have been

-toasted in the wine bar.

-Yes.

I mean, she does have that look.

She looks as though she would, you know, encourage a bit of bottoms up.

-Yes.

-I also rather like the way that her eyes are done.

I mean, they're done with a sort of touch of a brush,

rather than overly emphatic.

And when one is trying to work out what is a copy from an original,

very often with copies you get a hardness, a simplicity.

Something that just doesn't quite work.

So I'm sort of moving away from thinking that this is a later copy.

The question is, is it by him?

If it's not by him it's worth, I don't know, £1,000,

because it's a very nice looking image.

If it is by him it's worth probably £6,000 to £8,000.

And now, with the benefit of the sunlight on it -

I can't tell you how useful a bit of glare from the sun is -

I'm coming down clearly on one side.

This is an original.

-Oh, great.

-And therefore I don't know quite how much the debt was for

but I hope £6,000 to £8,000 covers it.

I hope so too! Yes. Thank you.

-Well, what have we got here? You tell me.

-Well, it's a Chinese bowl.

-I was given it by my uncle as a wedding present in 1979.

-Oh, right!

He, I think, inherited it from his grandmother

-who used it as a dog bowl for the Dandie Dinmont.

-Wonderful!

-Which is why it's been known in the family as Dandie's bowl.

-Lovely!

There is a family story that a diplomat in the family

looted it from the Summer Palace in Beijing

but I have no idea if that's right or not.

Let's just see how correct you are.

Yes, it's Chinese.

Yes, it's a bowl.

The age, of course, one can't actually determine

by how many generations it goes back.

That's a common mistake.

But it is old.

It was made during the reign of the Emperor Kangxi,

who reigned from 1662-1722.

-Gosh!

-So this is a late 17th century dog bowl.

THEY LAUGH

This has been entirely decorated by hand

in a palette we call fan hiver, named by a Frenchman

back in the 19th century and we've stuck to it.

It shows, most importantly, two redheaded Manchurian cranes.

Now, those cranes disappear in autumn. They fly away.

And in spring, back they come.

They mate for life so in Chinese it's symbolic of spring

and of marital fidelity.

So it's an appropriate wedding present.

It is. You've also got pine, which is symbolic of long life.

-Oh!

-So that's quite good too. And finally, the sun indicated...

or the moon, with a single line around it.

-I think it's a lovely thing.

-I do too.

Despite the flaking, I think it would sell for probably £2,500 to £3,500.

-That's quite a lot for a dog bowl.

-It is! Thank you!

-It's really quite large, this table, isn't it?

-It is.

It's very big. Very long.

I'm interested to know where it's come from and basically who made it.

Do you have any family history at all?

My uncle bought it in a house sale in Allington

and we believe he paid less than £10 for it.

-OK. So it wasn't last week.

-No. A good 50 years ago.

Right. OK. So, where does it come from?

Well, I can't tell you the house it's come from.

-I can tell you the country it comes from.

-Right.

-It's English.

-Super.

-But in the French style.

-Right.

So, the whole of this decoration here,

this leg here is actually an Italian form leg

but what became a cabriole leg was used in the French style

and all of this very effuse carving here on the frieze

-is typical of the rococo period of about the mid 18th century.

-Right.

-But is it 18th century?

-You tell me.

-No.

-It's 19th-century and it's Victorian.

-Right.

-1860 or 1870.

-Yeah.

-I don't know where this has come from.

A big house like Kirby Hall possibly.

When the extra wings were added on to the Victorian families,

we'll probably never find out where it was made for.

What I think is interesting is this carving, as I called it,

it's not the right word because if you look at it carefully,

can you see it's got splits all the way along on this foliage?

-That's because it's not carved wood.

-Yeah, plaster.

Plaster, it's composition, which obviously will affect the value.

-Yeah.

-There's another thing here, which I've noticed,

which may or may not affect the value. What have you been doing?

Well, that was my uncle.

He wanted to fit it around a skirting board, so he got his saw out.

Well, he's done it quite neatly, hasn't he?

Yes, he's a good carpenter.

But you can see the raw pine of the frame where he's cut it,

but what's interesting is, if you look at the top of the legs,

you can see these two holes on either side

and that is exactly what I was expecting to see

cos I'm sure there is a huge, great mirror,

again composition plaster mirror,

great big one, probably six-foot high.

There is one in the hallway, actually.

Oh. From this, do you think?

Probably not from this, but, yeah, there's two six-foot high mirrors.

Well, it's the sort of thing... It may well come from this.

I bet there was a pair of tables in a big ballroom, a big house.

And strange enough, there were some big houses of this Louis XIV style

on Clapham Common that had this type of furniture

in the 1850s and '60s. And you are using it today,

it's in the house, is it?

-Yes, it's just... It has pictures all over it.

-In the hall or something?

-Yeah, it's in our living room.

-The living room.

Yeah, well, it's perfect.

It's a perfect thing with this lovely white Carrara marble,

really very good quality marble.

-This was quite an expensive thing at the time.

-Right.

-So, well, it's big, isn't it?

-It's... Yeah.

And big isn't necessarily beautiful, but what's good about it

is that it's not too deep, that's the important thing.

It fits well in the room, actually.

Yeah, that's the good thing, in a big room. So valuation...

Under... Under £10 50 years ago.

Auction today...

-Easily 3,000 - 4,000.

-Oh, really? Really? I'm surprised. Yeah.

-And pleased, I hope.

-I am. I'm very pleased.

It's... Yeah, I do like it.

-It's a bit garish, but I do like it.

-Bling!

Well, normally, whenever I hear anything buzzing,

I run a mile and my family are in hysterics,

but this little bee brooch

is something I'm not going to run away from.

How did it come into your family?

It was my grandmother's

-and I think probably purchased after the First World War.

-Fantastic.

And how have you ended up with it?

Then her jewellery was split between my mother and her sister

and then I've looked after it because my mother is in a nursing home,

-so it will end up with my sister, probably.

-Yes.

But it's just been sat there, not being admired or anything?

My mother used to wear it a lot and my sister used to wear it.

Oh, that's lovely to see. In the Victorian...

-I don't!

-No!

-LAUGHTER

Maybe you should! It would be great!

In the Victorian period, bees, particularly, were seen as

a sign of reflecting the ideas of virtue and working hard.

The queen bee and all that.

So it's really fabulous to see such a good example,

which is all set with these beautiful old cut diamonds

and dainty little ruby eyes, so really quite fun.

Now, I'm not sure how much time you've spent looking at it,

but you've probably noticed that, if you turn it over,

we can see that there is a brooch pin fitting,

which is actually detachable.

You unscrew it here and then take that off

and you can actually put in a hairpin

and then wear it in the hair, so great fun.

So it's actually yellow gold on the bottom and then silver on the top,

which was typical of the way that Victorian jewellery was made,

so it's nice to see the two contrasts

and the silver on the top helps to keep the diamonds nice

and white because it's the whiteness in diamonds

that we like to see, so it's beautifully made, really gorgeous.

But late Victorian?

Date-wise, round about 1860-1870, so mid-Victorian

and reflects the love and passion

that, particularly, Queen Victoria had regarding nature.

-No markings on it.

-No markings.

We didn't have to have markings on jewellery in the Victorian period,

not until the 20th century that we start to see that come in.

So attributing it to a maker is very difficult,

but it probably would have been a good-quality maker.

-In England?

-In England, yes, absolutely. No, great fun.

Now, value-wise, of course, if it appeared at auction,

we'd be looking in the region of, probably,

£6,000 - £8,000.

-Very good.

-Yeah.

-Thank you very much, that's wonderful.

My pleasure. Thank you.

Now, this is a very strange shape, isn't it?

-It's a bit like a slipper gone wrong from Ali Baba's cave, isn't it?

-Yes.

What do you know about it?

I love it. I love it.

I inherited it from a friend who died a couple of years ago

-and I do know that it is Russian. It's got a date on it.

-Yes.

-1750.

Yes.

And it also, I think, has a coin at the bottom

and I don't know if it was made into a bowl from a coin,

but the coin, I think, is Elizabeth, who was the wife of Peter I.

Yes, absolutely.

Well, that's absolutely bull's-eye,

but it's a complete red herring!

Oh! Right!

No, it's brilliant research, but it is actually very, very much

later than that. It's almost certainly made in the 20th century.

-Oh, good Lord!

-Yes, but that's not a problem because, in fact,

it rather raises the stakes

in that this is a piece of Russian silver in the Slavonic taste.

It's called a kovsh and it's a great word.

It's a Slavonic wine-tasting vessel,

but its shape is secondary to the evocation of Russia.

Really, this is a patriotic object and the sight of it would

bring on sort of the evocation of old Russia,

terribly important to the imperial family

before the Russian Revolution,

when they became particularly self-conscious about their role

as successors to the Romanovs, so a very exciting object indeed for me.

-Oh!

-Yes, and in order to evoke this past even more clearly,

there is a coin from Empress Elizabeth in the base.

And so it's a bit of a sort of confection, if you like, but also,

it's in a technique which is very rare in this sort of enamel work.

More often than not, this is cloisonne enamel.

-Cloisonne means a bee's cell and the enamel is held in it.

-Yes.

And it is blind, usually,

but in the case of yours, against the brilliant sunshine,

we can see the colours coming through,

the blue and the green, and we actually this plique-a-jour enamel

and it's a corruption of applique a jour, applied to the day,

and it's a very rare and very hazardous technique of enamelling.

-Hazardous? Why?

-Well, because it's hard to achieve.

The silver has to be pierced and then it has to be backed with,

perhaps, copper and then the enamel fired into it

and then the lining removed, leaving the enamel like stained glass.

And we can add even a little bit more knowledge

-because it is actually signed with a hallmark.

-Yes.

Which not only tells me this is 20th century,

but it also tells me that it was made by

a cooperative silversmithing group called the 11th Artel

and the 11th Artel were...

-It's all very mysterious, isn't it?

-Yes! It is!

-And I'm not making it all up, either.

-It's fascinating!

-And...

Fascinating!

And the 11th Artel supplied the great houses

who were retailing silver of this type,

that included firms like Ovchinnikov and Khlebnikov

and, in competition to, of course,

the greatest goldsmith of the time, Faberge.

But Faberge wasn't terribly keen on these old Russian-style things.

He preferred to get his sources from elsewhere

and it couldn't really be more...

more desirable and I think this is a very rare expression

of this genre of enamelling from Russia and...

and I think, without a shadow of doubt, that it would fetch

-£2,500 - £3,000 under the hammer.

-Heavens! Oh, wonderful!

Thank you very much! Excellent!

But you're never going to part with it because it's...

-No, no, I love it.

-Exactly.

I love it and it is souvenir of this friend, so I will keep it.

I hadn't expected, when I turned up at the Roadshow today,

that I would see a massive political statement in the form of a chair.

Now, you carved this chair,

which is all about the MP's expenses scandal back in 2009. Why?

I chose it to commemorate my 30 years in business,

but I just thought it was a good story

and I wanted to spend the time and make something

that showed something of our political system, really.

It's quite something! I was so interested to see this

because obviously we did so much about this on the news

and I had long conversations

with the editor of the Daily Telegraph about it.

The Telegraph, you've got the newspaper there,

broke this story in May 2009.

I noticed you've put one of the more arcane things,

which was the duck house that an MP

certainly put down as an expense, it was deemed as not allowable.

Of course, you might think!

But the duck house was the one

-that really sticks in people's minds.

-Yes.

How fantastic!

-You must get a very strong reaction whenever people look at it?

-I do.

People are a bit amazed because you can't buy this in the High Street.

I think Paul Atterbury is probably the man he needs to look at it,

our expert Paul Atterbury. I can't wait to see what he says about it.

Neither can I!

I'm looking at a group, spread out here,

of toys and books from the mid 1920s to about 1930,

obviously much too old to be yours.

But they are all of the same date,

so were they from one generation in the past

or are they things that you've collected

particularly with that date in mind?

Well, all of these toys belonged to one little boy and the...

the story really started in 1930 and my mother,

who was 10 at the time, and her sister, who was 15,

took their little brother, Eric, who was seven, to a wedding

and when the bride came out of the church,

there was a sort of surge of people on the pavement

and the two girls crossed the road to see the bride better

and they shouted for Eric to cross and, unfortunately,

he did cross and there was a van and he was killed.

And, em, my grandmother, who obviously never ever got over that,

just put all his toys together in a box.

What a dreadful story!

Extraordinary! Incredibly moving. Your poor grandmother. Em...

And... Well, I'm...

I'm slightly sort of taken aback now because it seems rather...

sort of crass to start talking about...Eric's objects.

But...I think we should.

I mean, I think that Eric lived, he played with the toys,

he read his books and he had a life

and obviously he had a very happy life

if these were the things that he left behind.

I mean, the thing to talk about really are two German toys.

The first is this lovely little car in a garage

and, if I take it out of its little garage,

we can see...

on the side here, there is something that looks a bit like

a dumbbell or a press or something.

In fact, you can see it even better on the back there

and it's made by a company called Lehmann

and Lehmann were a company who produced a lot of these rather...

When I say "lightweight", they weren't...

They were actually physically quite light

and they were also sort of novelty toys

and they were known for that

and each of their toys has a number on it,

which, during the 1990s and 2000s,

meant that there were lots of people who collected Lehmann by number

and they'd say, "Oh, I'm missing a 765, I must look out for a 765.

"Oh, my goodness! Is this a 765? Yes, it is! Well, I must have that."

So there are a lot of people who collected Lehmann by number,

there was a lot of information on that company.

The other toy that I want to talk about is this,

which, looking at it, it in fact doesn't have a maker's mark on it,

but I think that it can probably be linked to a company

called George Levy, another German company

and what I love about this is this three-up, the family...

Or four-up if you count the teddy bear!

You've got the driver, his missus, the child

and the child holding the bear, it's absolutely wonderful.

They wouldn't have been cheap toys in the 1920s and 1930,

they would have been something that you probably saved up for

and maybe Eric knew that they were expensive

and played with them very carefully

because they are in really good condition.

The Lehmann toy here, a company that was in big manufacturing mode

in the 1920s, having started in the 1880s,

that toy, I would put at between

perhaps £300 and £500.

And the toy here, for various reasons,

I think first of all because it's a motorcycle

and there are lots of boys out there who collect motorcycles

AND it's by a good maker AND it's in good condition

AND you've got this teddy bear element as well,

I'm going to put that at around

£1,500 - £2,000.

SHE LAUGHS Gosh!

Yes.

I suppose, from my point of view, perhaps the one thing

that this collection is missing is a photograph of Eric.

And we do have a photograph of Eric.

In that case, Eric needs to be reunited with his toys

and then the collection becomes totally anchored into the family,

it's not anybody's collection, it's Eric's collection.

-And he deserves to be remembered.

-Mm-hm. Thank you very much.

That's really lovely and really good to hear the background to it,

-so thank you very much indeed.

-Pleasure.

Now, the minute I saw this enamel miniature,

-I started hearing music. This happens to me.

-Does it?

Do you know what I'm hearing?

I'm hearing Rimsky-Korsakov, I'm hearing Sheherazade,

I've lived with this music since I was about ten.

We had an old Dansette record player

and we had about half a dozen albums that we bought at the local Co-op,

cut price, and that was one that has always stayed with me.

And why oh why should that be?

Because we are looking at a pair of very exotic-looking dancers.

Just fill me in a little bit.

It was given to my maternal grandmother by Laura Knight,

who she knew.

Why she gave it to her, I don't know,

just probably as a friendship gift, I suppose.

And that's all I know.

It's always been at home and it's known as "the Laura Knight".

Well, it's interesting because you also brought along

your grandmother's address book

and I flicked through and there is a name I came across right away.

-Mr Harold Knight, husband of Laura.

-Yes.

I've had a bit of a look through this

and there are quite a few names of well-known artists,

so I think it's fair to say your grandmama was quite well connected.

-Yes.

-So, it's only tiny in scale. I mean, there are my fingers.

It is not just enamelled on copper,

but when you get into the subject matter,

you can see that there is little foil inclusions.

But, again, it's in the subject. Why am I thinking Scheherazade?

Because I think I'm looking at two members of the Ballets Russes.

I've got a character here who could or might be Anna Pavlova,

or could be maybe even Ida Rubinstein,

but we've got this very dark character in the back.

He's been made up to look like... like a Moor.

I can't help but think that must be Vaslav Nijinsky.

-We were always told it was Nijinsky and Pavlova.

-Oh, were you?

-That's what the story was.

-OK, well, I can't be specific.

-And I know, on the back, that it's actually dated 1915.

-Yes.

Which is remarkable because the Ballets Russes, at that time,

were certainly in Paris, performing Scheherazade.

-Oh, I see!

-So it all...

-It all fits in very nicely.

-Yes, yes.

-So what do I think?

I think that if I wanted to go and buy this today,

I don't think I'd get any change out of around about three...

-Possibly £3,500.

-Yes.

Thank you. It's lovely.

MUSIC: Scheherazade by Rimsky-Korsakov

I never know whether they should be standing on all fours like that

or upright, sitting upright. How do you have him?

Well, usually, he usually sits just standing,

sort of looking out at the room. Yeah, like that.

-Whoops.

-Of course, well, the head comes off and there is...

-Well, that's the drinking cup.

-Yes.

So you put strong liquor inside the belly

and then you pour it into the head and drink it back that way.

I haven't tried to do that, but I may now.

Well, it's worth trying out, but of course, the problem is

-that they are very vulnerable and they get broken very easily.

-Yes.

There's a...

We often, on the Roadshow, say

that if a thing looks too good to be true, it probably is,

but this is just...

-I can't see anything wrong with it!

-Really?

-So, that's always a worry.

Yes, so there must be something wrong with it somewhere.

Because it's, what, 250 years old,

it was made 1740s, something like that.

-Really?! Do you think so? As old as that?

-Well, that's what it should be.

-But tell me, is it?

-Holding it here, I think he's absolutely OK.

-Do you?

He's made in Staffordshire, it's a material we call salt glaze,

which is a hard pottery with a durable glaze that does last

and, if you're careful, then this is what it looks like.

Yes, I know, I'm interested in ceramics. I know about that.

A bit of folk pottery, a bit of fun. Just a joke.

A bear, sitting there, fine, crushed-up clay decorating his fur

and the chain on the end. There's not a chip on it! It's lovely!

No, I know.

So I'm always worried because there are so many fakes of these about.

-They have been copied for a long time.

-I know.

But, em...

Looking at him there,

he has lasted well, so a good object

and so, what's he worth as a happy bear from Staffordshire?

-Shall we say £4,000?

-Oh, no! Really?

-That's good, isn't it? But...

-Get a taxi home!

LAUGHTER Oh, my goodness!

There are many things in life I've wanted to be and never will be

and one of them is a woodcarver.

And, of course, I'm reminded about that

by this wonderful set of chisels in a chest.

Tools have a particular appeal because, in a sense,

they carry the history of all those who have used them.

-Now, are these yours?

-They are indeed.

-So, you've used them?

I do use them, yes.

So, when I take one of these out, and this is a rather magic one,

which has an engraving of a lady on it,

I can think of all those people who have used it.

-Do you feel the same?

-Oh, yes, absolutely.

So you are, in a sense,

-carrying on a very personal line of dedicated craftsmanship.

-Absolutely.

-So, you're a wood carver?

-I am indeed, yes.

This is a very specific statement, this chair. What drove you to do it?

I wanted to try and elevate woodcarving to...

to a more modern audience and woodcarving, really, for me,

hasn't been popular.

You don't see it in the High Street

and so I wanted to show what could be done in our age

and I chose the MP's expenses scandal

as a good story to illustrate that.

Now, of course, you are following a very, very long tradition,

as you are probably aware.

Artists, craftsmen, commenting on political activities

-and shenanigans is as old as politics.

-Yes.

I'm sure the ancient Greeks were doing it,

but in Britain, you can certainly go back to the 17th century

to find political cartoons, to find grotesques and caricatures

and it's a long tradition that goes on and on and on.

What it tells us is that, by and large, we have been ill served

by badly behaved politicians for ever, nothing changes.

-But it's more about human nature. People ARE greedy.

-Yes.

They have a choice, whether to be right or wrong,

and so that's also what it shows.

And those with their noses in the trough tend to be greedier.

-Absolutely.

-Let's look at the chair.

-So we've got Cameron, Brown and Clegg...

-Yes.

-..in rather embarrassing positions...

-Yes.

-..exposed by the malpractice of their colleagues.

-Yes.

Let's remember the history of that occasion.

The Daily Telegraph ran a series of stories

-thanks to the Freedom Of Information Act.

-Correct, yes.

This was all information that had been kept very quiet.

Thanks to that act, it came into the public domain

and I remember, day after day after day,

they ran these revelations about misuse of expenses,

but one of the great features of it was Sir Peter Vigger's duck house,

which was an ornament for his garden,

which apparently he may or may not have claimed expenses for.

-Does this reference to it?

-This is a reference, yes.

-And does this reference to it?

-It does.

So you need to know the iconography of the occasion, don't you,

to pick up the messages? The other thing was about switching houses.

-Flipping.

-Flipping, that's the phrase.

And, of course, we can do it. We can turn a little cottage into a castle.

-Yes.

-And back again...

-And back again.

-..if you need to.

-Yes.

And you can do it again that side. I think this is a great reference.

So you're making all those points.

I am, in a very physical way.

You can't get away from this chair, unfortunately.

-No. It lives with you?

-It does.

-It's at home?

-Yes, yes.

-You sit on it?

-I have done.

How long did it take?

There are over 500 hours tied up in this chair,

-so about three and a half months of my life.

-Right.

And how did you pick the woods?

I wanted to use traditional English timbers

and we've got a mix of normal oak.

We have a wood called tiger oak, which is this part, or brown oak.

And then the suits are actually made from 2,000-year-old bog oak,

found on the Fens,

so it is this rich black colour all the way through.

-So it's a very British statement?

-Oh, yes.

But anyway, I think it's great.

It's a very important record of a political drama of recent times.

You're in a good tradition.

It's an extraordinary thing to make

and it's also an extraordinary thing for me to think about valuing.

If this appeared, let us say, conventionally,

it turned up with no history at auction, as a curiosity,

it might fetch £2,000, £3,000, £4,000, even £5,000,

but of course, because of its political resonance,

in a sense, the sky is the limit.

If you can find the right political buyer who wants to celebrate,

if that's the right word, that dreadful moment,

then 10,000 and upwards.

-Right.

-There is no price I can put on it for that reason.

In the right context, with the right buyer,

it's an extremely valuable object

and maybe getting worth all those hours you spend on it.

-LAUGHING: Yes!

-It should be sitting in the Palace of Westminster

to remind all those people about how they should behave.

-Yes.

-Well done.

-Thank you.

You definitely win the prize for smallest pet of the day.

What is it and why, more importantly?

Well, it's something I spotted in auction a few years back.

And I guess I just wanted a low-maintenance pet.

You certainly got low-maintenance! Have you found out what it is?

The breed is a black-and-tan terrier, which I believe to be extinct now.

-Yes.

-I've got the original nameplate and it is dated 1866.

Dated 1866, this was at the height of the Victorian collecting market

for this type of miniature animal.

I know it's a bit ghoulish,

but in Victorian times things were different and they would use

stillborn puppies to make these taxidermy specimens.

-Have you done your research as to its size?

-I've done a bit of...

a bit of research.

I've not done too well,

but there's not a lot of information out there on them,

but I believe it to be,

if it is genuine, I believe it to be

probably the smallest recorded dog, it's about ten centimetres tall.

But that's the key, you see. The SMALLEST recorded.

I know the one you are referring to

and that is about ten centimetres high.

-If yours is even a TINY bit smaller, then this is quite a find.

-Yes.

But you do have to be really careful when buying this sort of thing

because there were fakes made, even in Victorian times,

so a bit more research, really check it out.

If it is, and you should do your research,

2,000 - 3,000, easily.

Wow. Wow. That's a surprise.

But even if it isn't the smallest, it still has a value,

-which would be £1,000 - £1,500 quite comfortably.

-Yeah, that...

That's great. That's still fine.

How many suitcases have you brought?! How many suitcases?!

Is there anything left in your house as we speak?

Yeah, there are a few things. There is the kitchen sink.

Well, there's some great things, but I mean,

there's one thing that stands out and it is that. It's that vase.

-So, where did that come from?

-That came from a friend.

His auntie had died and he had all his friends come around

and, you know, sort of help themselves to what they wanted

and that was the last thing, but I loved it. I loved it.

I saw it and I thought, "How beautiful! I really love it!"

And I also knew about Clarice Cliff

and I had a look at it

and I thought, "You know, that is so reminiscent of Clarice Cliff,"

although I had a look and I didn't see a signature.

In fact, I have been looking for a signature ever since.

-Yeah, there's nothing on it.

-It has not got a signature.

So, would you be really pleased if it was Clarice?

-I would be overjoyed!

-Really?

And, you know, I would be able to get one up on my children!

LAUGHTER

Well, then, when you go home, you can get one up on your children

-because there's nothing wrong.

-Oh!

That is a Clarice Cliff vase.

SHE SHRIEKS EXCITEDLY

LAUGHTER

-Oh, that is...

-Out of all your boxes...

-All my rubbish!

LAUGHTER

It was worth it! It was worth it!

All your dishes, all your plates, all your pots, or your crocks,

right in the middle you've got a great piece of Clarice.

-Oh, fantastic!

-There's nothing wrong with it, it's absolutely perfect,

it just left the factory without a mark on the bottom.

It dates from about 1936, it's in a pattern called Taormina Pink

and today that vase is worth around £150 - £200.

That's better than a smack in the face!

LAUGHTER

-And thank you. There you go!

-Oh!

-Oh, brilliant! It was well worth it.

-Good.

This is an easy one for me because it is what it says on the box!

It is famous football teams

and it's made by the manufacturer William Britain.

William Britains were known for making lead soldiers

and they produced them right the way up into the 1950s

and they must have made millions

because we see them all over the place.

Football sets, though, are quite rare.

So, let's see who is inside.

Can I ask you just to hold that? Oh!

So, unusually, you've got two teams here

because they normally were just sold with one.

Now, my knowledge of football strips is limited,

so I'm going to have to ask for your help.

Can you identify which teams they are?

I think that could be Aston Villa.

That's right, and the other team is Blackburn Rovers, I think.

-Two of the main teams in the 1930s.

-And are you a fan?

I'm a fan of football, yeah, but I don't support any of those two teams.

So, how did they come into your possession?

They are my partner's late father's.

He was born in 1924,

so sort of mid '30s he probably would have had them.

-Was he an Aston Villa or...?

-Yes, he was an Aston Villa supporter.

He was born quite close to the ground in Aston, in Birmingham.

Yeah, he was a very avid football fan and sportsman, actually.

-These were made in 1935-ish, so he would have been about ten?

-Yes.

An ideal age to be playing with your...football team.

Well, as I say, rare, but what you've got is two teams here.

They were only sold, normally, one team per box,

so he obviously got two boxes and amalgamated them into the team.

And remarkably, not only does it have the goal posts

and the corner posts and the referees and the linesmen,

but the rarest thing, and the thing that always goes missing,

-is the football!

-Yeah.

-And you've got two!

THEY LAUGH

So, not in the greatest condition, obviously well played with,

but should you ever decide to sell it, today we'd be thinking about

a figure at auction of between... probably £1,500 and £2,000.

Oh...yeah, that's good, yeah.

quite shocking, really, I didn't realise they'd be that...

you know, that collectible.

Very collectible, and should you sell them, that'll get you into

-at least four or five Premiership games!

-Yes, it would!

It was given to me by a very close friend as a birthday present.

I don't know where it came from, but we were in London,

and lived near Portobello Road,

so it could have come from there, but I am not sure.

Well, there's a newspaper on the back, you showed me,

-which has a date on it.

-Yes.

-So do you think it's that date, 1827?

-I don't know.

-Well, it's not.

-It isn't.

-No.

It's known as a stumpwork picture,

which really started in the sort of 16th, 17th century.

And it was a way of having

a three-dimensional needlework picture,

so you would have layer upon layer of felt,

and then they would have metal thread

and gold thread, silver thread,

on top of the felt.

And it gave you this wonderful three-dimensional look about it.

-Um, it would have been made somewhere in Britain.

-Mm-hmm.

It could have been commissioned by a very rich family -

it was a very expensive piece to have made -

to hang on their wall.

And it would be somewhere in the region of 1650 to 1660.

Somewhere in that region.

It's got a background of silk satin,

and it would have been bright, bright colours.

Fantastic colours. And while we're talking about colour,

I don't know whether you've noticed that right, right down here,

there's the remains of some very bright red in the background.

Oh, yes.

The red tends to go first, then the blue.

-You can see a little bit of blue here.

-Yes.

But what I love about it is the whole story,

and every time you look at it...

-There's something else.

-There's something else.

I mean, there's two people fishing here,

and it's totally out of proportion with a fountain there,

and there's a baby here...

-Anyway, the whole thing is so exciting.

-Oh!

Do you know what the story is?

Well, luckily, I found out from a very dear friend I rang

who is a vicar, and I talked her through the scene,

and she recognised it, and she told me what it was.

It's Elijah, who's given up, he's lain down under the tree,

and the angel comes along and says, "You can't die, you get up now,"

and this widow, who's the widow of Sychar, with her child,

comes along to give him sustenance.

Gives him a loaf of bread - there are two loaves in there -

-and oil. And you see that chain round her neck?

-Yes.

She's got oil on her back. And from then on, having given Elijah

the oil and the bread,

-she has oil and bread for the rest of her life.

-Ah!

-Isn't that wonderful?

-It is indeed.

So it's just the most fantastic scene.

I would happily say it's worth £3,000.

Even in that condition.

Gosh, yeah.

Well, well, well.

It's not often in English art that you get something so pure, crisp,

abstract, modernist as this.

And I'm right in thinking the name Ben Nicholson is attached?

It is indeed, yes. It's the Ben Nicholson wall

that was at Sutton Place, and still is,

and my father constructed it.

So this is the maquette, then, a preparatory work,

for a very famous piece of sculpture, in a garden,

-and I think you've got a photograph of it here.

-I have.

-You've been to visit it.

-We have, yes.

Erected in the early 1980s,

and by one of the most important international abstract painters,

and sculptors, at work in England in the 20th century, Ben Nicholson.

-Mm-hmm.

-So how did your father get involved?

Well, my father came from Ireland with the family in 1957,

he'd worked at Harland and Wolff shipyard as a marble mason,

came to work at Whitehead & Sons in London,

and the company was commissioned to make this sculpture for...

To create this big piece of garden sculpture.

It's stunningly beautiful, and absolutely enormous.

I mean, it must be 15 feet high and about 30 or 40 feet wide.

Now, there's an image beneath it of a man at work.

-Yep, that's my dad.

-So this is him working on the actual original?

That's him actually working on the original sculpture, yes.

And they used diamond-toothed saws, I believe,

because that's the only thing that will cut marble.

And then we have something else here behind - what is that?

That's Prince Charles and Lady Diana - later Princess Diana -

being photographed in front of the wall.

You can see how it relates in scale to people.

It's really useful seeing a piece of sculpture like that.

And they're a long way forward,

so you can really see the size of the piece,

because that is an awful long way back from them.

20, 30 yards, probably.

And amazing when you think of your father's contact

-with such an important 20th-century sculptor.

-Yes.

I mean, he worked with Barbara Hepworth,

he settled in St Ives, but he went on in his art, in his sculpture,

in his ideas, to be a truly international modernist artist.

-Yes.

-You know, someone of whom Britain is inordinately proud

-in the 20th century.

-Indeed, yes.

And my father said that there were three maquettes made,

one of which Nicholson family had,

one of which the Whitehead & Son family had,

-and my father was given this one.

-So this is one of the three.

-It was.

-Well, what a wonderful thing to own!

-Fantastic.

-So we ought to think about a valuation for it.

Well, the value's immaterial to me,

-but...

-Well, unfortunately, it's boringly material to us!

THEY LAUGH

Er, so, I can see this being worth

-£20,000 to £30,000.

-Good God.

You will need to dust very carefully!

LAUGHTER

Good Lord.

Amazed.

This is all looking terribly dull.

Er, what do you think it's made of?

Er, I was hoping it would be silver,

but I have a feeling it could be tin?

Well, I can give you some good news - it is silver!

-Oh, fabulous, great.

-Do you know where it was made?

-No, I don't. No, not...

-OK, well.

I have an idea it could be Germany or Russia,

-but I'm not...

-Second time right.

It's Russian.

And this is a particular trompe l'oeil effect

that you get being produced in Russia,

this wonderful sort of folded cloth.

But as it is now, because it's covered in all this powder,

we're not really seeing properly the magnificence of it.

Now, what I want to do is actually just go over it with a cloth.

OK, now the effect actually of doing this should be quite dramatic.

And can you see...

..what's happening here?

That we've got the silver with all this wonderful detail

-against the gilding on that side?

-Oh, wow, lovely.

And so we've got this wonderful contrast

-between the gold and the silver.

-Wonderful.

Having said it's from Russia, are there any family connections?

My great-grandmother was German,

but she was, well, we think she was born in Russia, in Archangel.

So we've kind of connected the two. Er...

and then they moved to London,

and this came too.

Which is absolutely splendid.

I mean, they are such lovely things. By the time that's clean,

it is going to look stunning with the contrast between the two.

This trompe l'oeil effect that they wanted to achieve.

What would you put on it?

I don't know - it's a very unusual shape,

and with the little serviette, I wouldn't have a clue.

-Well, it had a very specific use in Russia.

-OK.

-And that was for bread and salt.

-Oh, right!

This is what you would serve up your bread and salt on.

OK?

Now, we do have marks, as well.

And the marks read Moscow, 1883.

-Ah, OK!

-Now, those initials, do they mean anything to you?

Yes, they're my grandmother's initials.

There's a C and an M for Clara...Mormon, I think her name was.

She was the German lady.

Well, it's a delightful object, it really is.

You don't see that many of them over here,

although there's a lot of Russian work in Britain.

But, um, we do of course have to think about the value.

Yeah.

And...I would suggest today

it should be selling for in the region of £1,200, £1,500.

Wow! That's lovely.

Better than a bit of old tin!

That's wonderful, thank you very much. That's lovely.

Now, I saw you with this stretcher in the queue,

and sometimes people have to wait a while to see an expert so they

bring along a chair - I thought this was taking things a bit far!

Tell me about this stretcher.

Er, it was purchased by me approximately 30 years ago

at a small military show.

And the person that I bought it off, he said it come from the local area,

and it was in someone's shed or barn or something.

-That's all I really know about it.

-And it's Second World War.

It's a Second World War stretcher, and it's American.

And do you ever use it as a stretcher?

Er, I've never actually used it, no!

Well, I was speaking to one of our experts,

who said...I mean, it's quite rare that this has survived,

because usually the mechanism was used for wheelbarrows

and carts after the war.

And the stretcher bit got thrown away.

So it's great that you've still got it. You've never used it?

No, I haven't, no.

Well, it's valued at about £100, um...

I thought we might give it a go. What do you think?

I'd be willing to give it a go, yes!

Now, I'll need a volunteer.

Shall we use the more strapping chap? Do you mind, madam?

Do you want to grab that end? Let's see if it still works.

-It's Frank, isn't it?

-It's Frank, yes.

-Do you want to get on?

-I will!

Come on, let's risk it for a biscuit!

Right.

That way? Come on then! Oof!

LAUGHTER

-Well, it works!

-It does!

So, what a beautiful scent bottle,

and it's glowing in the sunshine here.

And it's glowing because it's gold and hardstone.

But tell me about it with you.

I inherited it from my cousin, whose miniature I have here,

and it was he who left me this beautiful scent bottle.

And it is utterly beautiful, and it's quite surprising, I think,

what a luxurious object it is.

Because the conjunction of precious metalwork and stone

is something incredibly ancient

and was a status symbol since the Renaissance.

And here we have mid-19th-century lapidary work

and gold-mounted scent bottle,

um, but the message is the same,

that it's for a rather high-status person,

somebody who could actually afford an object of great luxury like this

in the 19th century.

And of course it is a conventional scent bottle here,

but it's made by a firm called Sampson Mordan,

who were enormously sophisticated engineers in this sort of work.

And there's a loaded, um, stopper here, with a spring,

so that when you close it down,

inside, it makes a perfect seal, so the scent can't come out.

And the other end, it has the vinaigrette.

Yes, it does. And let's have a look.

And a vinaigrette isn't something everybody encounters

on a daily basis, but it's another way of taking scent.

And there would be a little sponge underneath this grille,

which would be loaded with rose water,

and you'd use it when there was sort of unpleasant effluvia

around and about, which there certainly was in the 19th century,

and perhaps if you were in a coach or something like that

and you wanted to smell that to mask an unpleasant associated odour,

well, that's great. But the point about it is

its function is almost secondary

to the fact that it is a luxurious object.

It's carved, hollowed from stone.

-It's nice to hold.

-Very tactile, isn't it?

but it is jasper, it's called bloodstone,

and it's called bloodstone because it's green flecked with red.

And there are collectors of scent bottles, thematic collectors,

and they would be jolly pleased to find that.

And there are people interested in goldsmith work and lapidary work,

so I'm thinking somewhere in the region of £2,000,

-possibly even £3,000.

-Mm-hmm. Yeah.

-But you don't care, do you?

-It's very nice!

-No, it's nice to know! Yes, yes.

-I don't care that much.

But I think you care even less than me!

It's absolutely brilliant to meet you,

-and you brought wonderful things, and thank you very much.

-Thank you!

-It's an electric lamp.

-Yes.

-Did you convert it?

-No.

-Well, that's a relief!

-But who did convert it? Do we know?

-Um, I'm not quite sure.

It belonged to my great-aunt.

I think they bought it in an auction

and probably bought it as a lamp.

At what time, do we know?

-Er, 1950s.

-Right.

-So it was probably old when it was bought.

-Yes.

But how old is it, that's the question we need to ask.

Because it is an Italian majolica drug jar.

But is it an old one or is it a newer one?

I think it was certainly old when they bought it,

because actually it started life as an oil lamp. If you look in,

-here is the well...

-Oh, yes!

-..where the oil would have been kept.

So from a drug jar, it's been made into an oil lamp,

and this here actually comes off

and that's where the oil burner would have been,

and the flue and the shade.

And then probably in the 1920s they've converted it,

you get conversion kits, for the newfangled electricity.

Which you still use today.

-Right.

-But was it new when it was bought? That's the question.

I suppose we should look at it first.

It's got the splendid decoration round the front, "Mostarda F",

which I think stands for "mostarda di frutta,"

which is a North Italian fruit conserve with mustard extract in it.

And it's great that we've got all these sort of quinces

and figs and different fruits which probably were the fruits

that were inside this jar And it was obviously,

we call it a drug jar, but it's a storage jar in effect.

-And obviously it was quite a lot of jam!

-Mmm, yeah!

Um, have you ever looked into its date, or...?

Um... Well, my husband and I were at the Victoria & Albert last year,

and we saw a jar exactly the same size

which looked as though it could have been made by the same potter.

That was, I think, a 15th-century Italian drug jar.

15th century.

Well...

as a 19th-century jar, it's £400 to £600.

Very nice.

But it's not.

It's Venetian.

-It's about 1520.

-Wow!

And it's worth £10,000.

GASPS AND LAUGHTER

Oh, my goodness!

So I think you should stop using it as a lamp!

-Yes - it's got a hole in!

-It has, a hole and a couple of cracks,

but it is, I'll say it again, Venetian, 1520.

-£10,000.

-Wow!

-I think you should stop using it as a lamp,

beautiful as it is!

Well, thank you very much, that's amazing!

-I hope it's a pleasant surprise.

-It is!

I almost feel I should cut the flex off and stop you now!

LAUGHTER Oh, bother! What am I going to use?

We're so grateful to everyone who's come to see us at Kirby Hall today.

But I don't know what one of the owners would have made of it

when he was here. Sir Christopher Hatton,

Chancellor to Queen Elizabeth I. When he bought the house,

it overlooked the medieval village nearby, and he was so horrified

that he had to look at the riff-raff through his window

that he had the village razed to the ground, and all that's left of it

are sort of bumps and lumps in the grass.

So heaven knows what he would have made of us here today!

We've enjoyed it, though. From Kirby Hall in Northamptonshire, bye-bye.