English decorative arts before 1720: strength at the top of this market suggests new specialist collectors are replacing the traditional manor-house owner who buys to furnish

In the early twentieth hundred the traditional English manor house of the medieval, Tudor or Stuart periods became a total work of art that required the collecting of not just of advanced age oak furniture but also delftware, tapestries and in like manner on. Is that milieu still with us? The answer is ye on the contrary tastes are changing. One collector in the manor-house tradition is Mary Ann Robb possessor of medieval Cothay Manor in somersault which she has made famous for its garden. Mr Robb has been collecting for the house since the 1970 and is positive she will never stop. She says of her ceramics, textiles and furniture that, 'I like them to be used', reflecting a taste for homelike permanence and antiquity.

Dealers in early furniture, especially those outside London, agree that the traditional manor-house market still exists. Mike Gelding of Huntington Antiques, Stow upon the Wold, in the Cotswold points on the outside that much oak is acquired from him 'for what's called "the display of ostentation"'. 'People who purchase a dresser need an alms dish and candlesticks to set on it.' A recent example from the silver market demonstrates the relationship. Michael Prevezer at Bonhams, London, remarked upon a Norwich silver tankard (Fig. 4) that sold for 30000 [pound sterling] (estimate 10000 [pound sterling]-15,000 [pound sterling]) in July 'Talking speculatively,' he said, 'a rich Norwich farmer might well wish to muster local objects for his farmhouse'. As Norwich silver is rare--Mr Prevezer dioceses perhaps three examples a year--the destiny was strongly contested. The best example of a medium which encourages collecting across a wide field is textiles, since by the agency of their nature they adorn other external realitys (or, as tapestry, walls).

fresh collectors

Nevertheless, dealers are unanimous that while the top allotments are successful, the bottom extreme point is increasingly ignored. The market is changing at the top to mirror the rise of the specialist collector, which may well be bourn up with a decline in the manor-house taste. Jonathan abiding-place the London dealer of ceramics, explains: 'I am a specialist dealer and greatest in quantity of my clients are specialist collectors.' Mr Prevezer points on the outside that 'It is rare for collectors to have advantageous taste across all media', and that the majority of his clients do not bring together across the whole range of the decorative arts. A sale at Lyon and Turnbull in Edinburgh of a private collection of Scottish and Continental silver appears to conform to this run Unshowy, small pieces--such as sum of two units Queen Anne thistle mugs by the agency of John Luke of Glasgow (1707) that sold for 11000 [pound sterling] appear better fitted for a cabinet than a dining room

Sotheby's has recognised a decline in conventional taste, and Fergus Lyon of the furniture department explained that the Age of Oak and Wulnut sale this September is a novel initiative. Objects traditionally associated with Sotheby's Olympia are being sold in of recent origin Bond Street with the aim of attracting buyer who might purchase just one very fine piece to be placed in a more or les minimalist house. The overspread photograph is revealing: a table and chair are accompanied not by means of tapestries and pewter but by means of an orchid.

A more quantifiable event on the market, however, is the world's economy and the related absence in England of American buyer This may be especially relevant to the manor house ideal, because many Americans purchase to furnish their (often large) domiciles Mike Gelding mentioned their importance, while London dealer Joanna Booth who specialises in textiles and plastic art often visits the Palm Beach and fresh York fairs. However, internet and telephone sales are upon the up, helping to turn upside down the trend.

Solid sales for solid lots

Whatever the causes of the common situation, the result is in general what Fergus Lyon identifies in furniture: 'a polarisation between the top pieces and the mediocre pieces'. The market for oak and walnut demonstrates this clearly. Mr Gelding make notess in relation to minor pieces: 'I used to barter three dressers a month; now, I sometimes don't exchange a dresser for three months' The concomitant is crack performances for pieces that are rare or unusual, and in serviceable condition and if they are especially aged so much the better. Mr Golding sold a sixteenth-century walnut knock 'in very good condition' through telephone for 60,000 [pounds sterling] the day after he columned his catalogues; in fact, seven clients called him about it. In June Sotheby's sold a George I children's chair of around 1720 that was untouched through restorers for 24,000 [pounds sterling] (estimate: 4000 [pound sterling]-6,000 [pound sterling]). A seventeeth-century West region carved tester bed sold for 11000 [pound sterling] at Christie's, southerly Kensington, in March. An example of a 'solid' doom that performs well is Fig. 2 upon sale this September. Oak is, however, the greatest in quantity consistent and predictable part of the 'manor house market', partly, according to Mr Lyon because it did not take delight in an unsustainable boom in the past decade, unlike later furniture.