Silver & Silver-plated items

The collection of medals awarded to Ernest Shackleton, the most decorated of the Polar explorers, excelled at a recent Christie’s South Kensington sale.

The perpetrator of a chilling raid on an antiques shop in Honiton more than a year ago has been jailed.

A silver medal awarded to a lifeboatman who rescued sailors from a sinking ship in hurricane-force winds off the Kent coast in 1891 is to be sold at Canterbury Auction Galleries.

This rare Irish provincial silver punch strainer took £14,000 at Lawrences’ latest sale in Crewkerne. Dated to c.1740-60, it is struck twice for Joseph Johns, one of only a handful of silversmiths working in Limerick in the middle of the 18th century.

This 5in (12cm) high pair of Victorian salts in the form of kangaroos made by Bond Street silversmiths Hunt & Roskell sold for £18,000 at Catherine Southon’s latest sale at Farleigh Court Golf Club near East Croydon.

This Tiffany Studios c.1905 table lamp proved the highlight of Denhams’ recent fine art sale in Horsham, Sussex. It was an unusual visitor to the UK regional saleroom.

Sales of coins and medals at UK auctions have doubled in value over the past decade to £44.7m.

James Watson’s 1962 award for his work on DNA set a world record price for a Nobel Prize Medal at Christie’s in New York when it sold for $4.1m (£2.6m) hammer.

Christie’s New York are offering the 1962 Nobel Prize gold medal awarded to Dr James D. Watson, one of the world’s greatest living scientists.

A possibly unique electroplated coffee pot, designed by Christopher Dresser (1834-1904) and made by James Dixon & Sons in Sheffield, proved the highlight of Lyon & Turnbull’s sale auction ‘Decorative Arts: Design from 1860’ when it was knocked down for £80,000.

This Fabergé enamelled silver and hardstone cigarette box sold for £46,500 at the latest sale held at Nicholas Mellors of Newark.

The quarterly auction of silver and plated wares held by Fellows in the Birmingham Jewellery Quarter on September 22 included a family collection of eight apostle spoons formed several generations ago.

The Christopher Foley collection of British commemorative medals will be sold at Salisbury auctioneers Woolley & Wallis on October 16. The sale is the most comprehensive of its type seen for a century or more.

It’s only recently in the decade-long boom in Chinese works of art that Far Eastern buyers have come to appreciate once again the merits of Export silver. Once a neglected area, academic interest has been piqued in the subject as the marketplace moves in leaps and bounds.

Discovered at a regional valuation day held in Shropshire by Hansons of Etwall, this Tiffany and Co. silver and mixed-media tea caddy had been a wedding gift and had remained in the family of the vendor since the 1920s.

A strong selection of Tudric (pewter) and Cymric (silver) creations by Archibald Knox for Liberty & Co was the focus of keen bidding at Bonhams’ decorative arts from 1860 sale in New Bond Street.

Seventeenth century Dublin trefid spoons are extremely scarce. Last year a single rat-tailed example by Andrew Gregory, 1685, sold for €9000 at Adams of Dublin.

A rare example of 18th century Jamaican silver was a highlight of the latest decorative works of art sale held by Matthew Barton of Blythe Road, Olympia.

James II large silver chinoiserie footed salver, the circular top flat-chased with a continuous border of four Oriental figures, two long-legged birds and further birds in flight among palm trees and other foliage, beneath sunrays emerging from clouds and further clouds. London 1688 by Benjamin Yate (maker`s mark YT), diameter approx 131/2in (34.3cm). Estimate £30,000-50,000. Sold for £30,000 hammer at Tooveys of Washington, West Sussex, May 21, 2014.

A massive cache of British Arts and Crafts metalware and ceramics stored in a bank for over 25 years will be sold by Bonhams through their forthcoming decorative arts auctions.