Edinburgh

The feast from the east that that has put bread (and some Michelin-starred meals) on the table of dealers and auctioneers for more than a decade continues to do so at sales from Scotland to Surrey.

One of the smallest but most eye-catching lots at the Oriental sale at Bonhams Edinburgh (25% buyer’s premium) was two 4¼in (11cm) high Manchu officials’ bronze seals.

In the year of the 150th anniversary of Charles Rennie Mackintosh’s birth, Lyon & Turnbull has sold the very key used to open his design masterpiece, The Glasgow School of Art, in 1899.

One says Scottish rather than Scotch except when one is referring to the spirit – or indeed, motor spirit as evident at the Edinburgh rooms of Thomson Roddick Scottish Auctions (17.5% buyer’s premium).

A collection of Outsider art produced in a former psychiatric hospital in north London will be offered for sale at Edinburgh auction house Lyon & Turnbull.

Lyon & Turnbull has appointed Philip Smith, former head of modern & post-war art and design at Mallams, to the newly created role of associate director for modern art and design.

“It’s not the age or pedigree – it’s the look of the piece.” The phrase became less a heresy and more a cliché during the latter years of the furniture boom of blessed memory, when the increasingly influential decorator trade was spending substantial sums on 19th and early 20th century reproductions.

An album of Indian photographs sold for £32,000 in Edinburgh provided ATG’s Pick of the Week in the previous issue (No 2331), but there was much more on offer in that 550-lot Scottish sale.

The generally encouraging start to the year enjoyed by English auctioneers extends to Scotland where Lyon & Turnbull (25% buyer’s premium) enjoyed a buoyant season-opener.

Sold at £6000 in a recent Scottish sale was an early golfing item. The 1839 edition of Rules of the Game of Golf adopted by the Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers shown below was still in the original wrappers and bore an 1852 ownership inscription of one Henry Wells.

A country house library in south-west Scotland was the source of an album of 19th century photographs of India that provided a Valentine’s Day surprise at Lyon & Turnbull in Edinburgh.

For the Fine Art Society in Edinburgh, the year kicks off with an exhibition of 20th century printmaking.

The rising popularity of the tribal art collecting scene is tempting auction houses to take steps in that direction.

More than £730,000 worth of pictures changed hands at Edinburgh saleroom Lyon & Turnbull’s (25/20% buyer’s premium) recent sale of Scottish art.

It was around this time of year when wealthy skiers with chalets to decorate would dial in from the slopes of the world’s most prestigious resorts to take part in Christie’s South Kensington’s annual Ski Sale.

The season, the spirit in question and the location of the sale put this bottle of Lagavulin whisky, below, into the spotlight.

Our weekly selection from salerooms and dealerships.