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Antiques Roadshow Season 44 Episodes 1 | Ham House 1
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00:40On a perfect day like today, there's nothing nicer than strolling along the river.
00:45This could be the River Cam, the Severn, the Tay.
00:50No, it's the River Thames.
00:52We're in London, just 10 miles from the heart of the capital in Richmond.
00:59And the leafy suburb of Richmond-upon-Thames is the only borough of London to straddle both sides of the
01:05river.
01:08And is home to a magnificent Jacobean mansion, Ham House.
01:13Built in 1610, Ham House is the ultimate 17th-century example of fashion and power.
01:19And it's also much favoured by the movie industry as well.
01:22It's featured in films like Anna Karenina, Sense and Sensibility, and you might just recognise it from Downton Abbey.
01:29But today, I'm pleased to say, it's centre stage for the Antiques Roadshow.
01:33We're doing things a bit differently this year.
01:36No large crowds or winding queues.
01:39Instead, our experts have sifted through thousands of your submissions and selected the most fabulous and intriguing.
01:46Such as this stunning robe.
01:49Could it be the most important Chinese treasure we've ever valued?
01:53Coming up...
01:55It was in the dressing up box. No.
01:57So, did you wear it as a child? Yes. Oh, yes.
02:01Two, one, zero. A blinding flash.
02:06I know. Wow.
02:08And she went in one day and found a group of people throwing knives.
02:13Hold on a second. What? People were throwing knives at this picture?
02:17So, how much did you pay for them?
02:19£25 for both of them. No!
02:21Oh, that £25, what a bargain!
02:24This is the best example I've seen. I was blown away when you got this out.
02:30It's rather nice.
02:34Now, we've got a portrait here by Francis Newton Souza, one of India's most famous 20th century artists.
02:42So, I want to know, is it a portrait of you?
02:46Oh, no. Not at all. No.
02:48So, how did it come to be yours?
02:49I used to go to school with his daughters. I knew his London family very well.
02:54My mum thought, we'd better pick up some of his work.
02:57So, she picked up that in sort of about 1970 from a dealer friend of Souza's.
03:02Not from himself, actually.
03:03She picked it up for £50.
03:05It's not bad for back then? No, no.
03:07So, I love that it's a portrait of a man.
03:11The way he's drawn out the features of this person.
03:16He's really elongated the nose.
03:19He's sculpted the jaw.
03:21And then actually, he's used a knife to get out the detail in a man's stubble.
03:26It feels so simple.
03:27But when you see it all together, it's just a really, really striking image.
03:32I think what's quite interesting about the portrait and the date, 1961, is that today, Souza is known as an
03:40Indian artist.
03:41That's right.
03:41But actually, the most formative and probably now the kind of most famous part of his career was when he
03:48worked in London for about 20 years.
03:50Okay.
03:50He moved here.
03:51He moved here in the late 40s.
03:53And in the 50s, he became friends with Steven Spender.
03:56He drank at the Colony Club with Francis Bacon.
03:59Right.
03:59So, he really was one of the most avant-garde artists working in London in the 50s.
04:04Yeah, yeah.
04:04So, I think, lucky you.
04:06Yes.
04:06You got your hands on one of his portraits from 1961 when he was still working in London and then
04:12he moved to New York.
04:13It sounds like when you first met his family.
04:15Yeah, yeah.
04:16I just missed him by five minutes on one occasion when I went round to see his daughters and they
04:20said,
04:20You've just missed him.
04:21He's just got a plane back to New York.
04:23So, I never actually met the man.
04:25What do you like about it?
04:26Well, at first I just thought there wasn't really much to it, but I've lived with it for so long
04:31now
04:31and it's so much a connection with the family that I knew and the fact that it was my mum's
04:36as well.
04:37She died a few years ago, so it's actually just become something that's part of me now.
04:41His works now are infinitely more well known in the last 30 or 40 years.
04:46So, I think if this was to come up to auction today, we'd probably put an estimate in the region
04:50of 7,000 to 10,000 pounds.
04:52Okay.
04:53Right.
04:54Lovely.
04:57That was great fun.
04:58My mum would have loved it if she'd been here.
05:01Really superb stuff.
05:02And it is a beautiful picture.
05:04It's sort of grown on me throughout the years.
05:06I've started drawing recently, just recently, the last year or two, and delighted to find I'm quite good at it.
05:13So, it may have had some connection, who can say?
05:20We don't see an awful lot of silver from Amman on the Roadshow, and I gather this is just the
05:24tip of the iceberg.
05:25This is from a larger collection, am I right?
05:27There's actually 94 pieces in total.
05:2994?
05:30Yes, but we couldn't bring them all today.
05:31How did it get to you?
05:34Well, it was donated to the Anglo-Armani Society.
05:36We're a British-Armani friendship society.
05:38And it was donated to us in 2013 by Sheila Bailey, who worked in the Sultan's palace office from 1972
05:46to 1984.
05:47So, I think, collected over that time all 94 pieces.
05:50The most obvious piece of Armani silverware is this kanjal, as they call them, which is your dagger that you
05:58wear around your waist with a blade inside that looks quite deadly.
06:02This one is what's known as a Saidi kanja, because the design of the top here was apparently designed by
06:11Saeed bin Sultan's Persian wife, decided that the flat-top kanja was too boring for her exotic husband.
06:17So, she made this rather differently shaped one.
06:22Have either of you lived in Amman or been to Amman?
06:24I lived there for six years. I went to school there, and my mum's from Amman, so...
06:29Okay, so you're familiar with this sort of thing?
06:31Some of them, yeah, and you can go to the markets there and see them and buy them there.
06:36And you have a dagger like this?
06:38I do. I have a khanjur, and I wear it for weddings and formal occasions, and it's not as dangerous
06:43as it looks.
06:44This is a very Amman-y looking object. It's actually called a talahiq.
06:49I believe the pronunciation is talahiq, but don't take my word from it. I'll have to look it up when
06:53I get home.
06:53Okay, all right. Well, I'll let myself off the hook a bit on that.
06:56Beautiful thing with silver and gold overlay. It's a powder horn, in fact.
07:01In Amman, of course, it's dry, so they went on using flintlock rifles and matchlock muskets long after other people
07:10in colder, wetter climates had had to abandon them.
07:12And the really fascinating part is that this is where European silversmithing meets Eastern silversmithing,
07:19because just across the Arabian Sea, a lot of these designs are continued.
07:23But these are obviously things made very much for Ammanis.
07:27I haven't seen the rest of the collection, but what's on the tabletop here is worth about over £1,000,
07:34maybe £1,500 for what's just on the tabletop.
07:37And this is just the thin end of 94 pieces.
07:43It's a terrific collection. I'm absolutely mad about it. I'm so grateful for you for bringing it along.
07:48You're welcome.
07:54At first glance, we have a pair of standard, Bohemian, Czech, mid-Victorian goblets, about 150 years old.
08:04But we can date them very precisely, because if we turn them like that,
08:10we see we have the two classic views of the great exhibition that was held in Hyde Park in 1851.
08:17How long have you known them?
08:20I only got them a few months ago, about three months ago, maybe.
08:23OK, and?
08:25I got them on social media.
08:26They were bigger than I thought they were going to be, and heavier, but I just really like them.
08:30And there's more detail than I thought there would be as well.
08:33To my way of thinking, we're talking about, there's a nice piece of glass,
08:37but the most extraordinary glass in here was this glass structure.
08:40The building itself, designed by Joseph Paxton.
08:42So you've got this hundreds of thousands of sheets of glass held up by this steel skeleton,
08:49six million visitors.
08:51It was a spectacular success.
08:53It was dismantled after the exhibition and moved to Sydenham,
08:57which was then renamed Crystal Palace in its honour,
09:01and it continued to serve various functions, including that of the National Art School,
09:05until it burnt to the ground in 1936.
09:09It was a complete catastrophe, because in my mind, this is as important to Britain
09:14as the Eiffel Tower is as to Paris, you know, and it's gone.
09:18I did find some others, so they're kind of standard production souvenirs.
09:22Yeah.
09:22So how much do you pay for them?
09:24£25 for both of them.
09:2625 quid!
09:27What a bargain!
09:28Absolutely fantastic!
09:30Well, you know, so basically, you're ten times your money.
09:32These are probably worth 250 to 300 quid.
09:36Oh, that's good.
09:38It is, isn't it?
09:38Yeah!
09:39It's going to be great!
09:43Our experts will tell you it's just a matter of time before something becomes collectible.
09:48Fashion is booming, and some brand names still have a bit of magic about them.
09:54I feel as if I'm on a sentimental journey.
09:57We're surrounded by really iconic objects from Bieber.
10:04Now, what is Bieber?
10:06I know what Bieber is.
10:07You tell me.
10:09Well, Bieber was an iconic fashion store from the 60s through to mid-70s.
10:15Let's just talk about the Bieber shop because, as you say, it started in the 60s.
10:20It was the brainchild of a designer called Barbara Hulanicki.
10:23It started out as a postal business, and then she had a small shop in Kensington,
10:29and she made, in 1973, this extraordinary leap from a small shop in a back street
10:36to taking over a department store on Kensington High Street in the middle of fashionable London,
10:42the Derry and Toms building.
10:43And it was a seven-storey edifice to fashion, and her particular brand of fashion.
10:50Yeah.
10:50Do you remember what the Bieber look was?
10:53Oh, yeah.
10:55My girlfriend at the time, annoying my wife, was quite a fashionable girl.
11:01And so, yeah, she was a Bieber-type person.
11:04A Bieber girl.
11:05So, it was about plum colour and dusty pink and rust and olive greens.
11:11It was a very kind of subdued palette that she used in her designing.
11:18But then the store itself was a...
11:21It was like an ode to Hollywood glamour.
11:25Oh, yeah.
11:26It was dark, and it was shot with gold and black-painted walls.
11:32And these mirrors, then, were the heights of...
11:37The spotlights of light within that building.
11:40So, look, we've established that you weren't a customer.
11:43Yeah.
11:44So, how have you got these things?
11:46With the demise of Bieber, everything in the shop was auctioned off,
11:49and certain teams were sent in to clear what had been purchased by different people.
11:55And my family was one of the teams.
11:58Right at the end, these were left.
12:02Other stuff had gone, and the overseer, I asked him, I said,
12:08what's going to happen with these?
12:09And he said, well, you can take them if you want.
12:12And I thought, well, I'll take them, because I actually like them.
12:15Yes, yes.
12:15I thought, and it'll be a shame if they got destroyed or thrown away, so...
12:20You've also got, which I suppose is more surprising, these pieces of paper.
12:25You've got headed note paper here.
12:27You've got something I would have killed for,
12:29which is an invitation as a private guest, obviously,
12:32to something happening in the Rainbow Room.
12:34You've got labels that would have been sewn into the clothes.
12:37You've got stickers that probably closed the bags.
12:39Yeah.
12:39And those were just, what, lying around?
12:41They would, as everything was demolished and taken apart,
12:44they were just tipped on the floor.
12:45You rescued them because you loved them.
12:48Yeah.
12:48I hope your girlfriend at the time loved it too.
12:51She'd appreciate it.
12:51My wife does now as well.
12:53Good, good, good.
12:54Quite right.
12:55And I think what you have is valuable.
12:59I mean, there's such a huge market for vintage.
13:03Okay.
13:03I'm sure it's going to be into four figures.
13:06I would have said between perhaps 800 and 1,200 pounds.
13:10I mean, on the day, who knows?
13:13Well, the money's not the most important thing.
13:15It's a case of keeping them for posterity, I suppose.
13:22You see lots and lots of things on the Roadshow, but very occasionally,
13:26something comes in and you think, oh, I was there.
13:29And to have that moment with Bieber and I can put myself back in there
13:33as a young teenager going through that shop and, you know,
13:38the emotion and the...
13:40It was just a palace to fashion and it was a wonderful opportunity
13:46to relive that.
13:47Brilliant.
13:54So, on the table we have a photograph album and a camera and a kit bag.
13:59So, who did these items belong to?
14:01They belonged to my father-in-law's brother, Eric Walno.
14:04He was on his national service.
14:06We found this in my father-in-law's loft when I was clearing it out.
14:11I just think it's a beautiful album written really nicely, really creative.
14:17I thought it was treasure.
14:19Now, as we can see, he's a sailor.
14:21He's on a ship called HMS Narvik.
14:24And we have this sort of postcard that they produced showing their route
14:28from England in 1956 all the way down to Australia to an island called Montebello.
14:37Now, at the end of World War II, the first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima.
14:43And that starts a race amongst all of the sort of the superpowers, which really starts the Cold War as
14:49to who can have the biggest and the most destructive bomb.
14:53But to find out if they work, you have to test them.
14:56And your relative was part of these tests because he's part of something called Operation Mosaic, which is the testing
15:03of two atomic bombs.
15:05This took place in 1956.
15:06And he goes down with HMS Narvik and he is part of the team that builds, first of all, the
15:14camp that they live in on this island.
15:18Yeah.
15:19And they're there for quite some time before these bombs are tested.
15:22But I think that the scariest part about this is that our lads were made to watch the bombs go
15:30off.
15:31And he is one of those sailors who stood there and waited for this thing to go.
15:38Yeah.
15:38Now, we all know what atomic bombs are.
15:40They're terrifying things that kill thousands of people in the initial flash.
15:45But not only that, but the radioactive fallout.
15:48Yeah.
15:48And he has this incredible part of his diary, which I'm going to read out.
15:53And it says,
15:55Five, four, three.
15:57The tension is electric.
15:59Two, one.
16:01Will it never happen?
16:02What if something is wrong?
16:04Zero.
16:05A blinding flash.
16:06Everything loses colour.
16:08The heat is terrific.
16:09One, two, three, four, five.
16:12Okay, chaps.
16:13You can look now.
16:14I know.
16:15Wow.
16:16To have seen that.
16:18And this photograph is what they turned round to.
16:21Yeah.
16:22That mushroom cloud full of flame.
16:25What happened to the sand on the island?
16:27Yeah, it all fused to glass.
16:30He survived?
16:32Yes, yes.
16:33He lived a long life?
16:34Until he was about 69, I think.
16:37It's an incredible album.
16:39Do we have to put a price on it?
16:40I think if it came up for auction, somewhere around about 500 to 800 pounds.
16:46It's not unique in its day, but by now there can't be many left.
16:50No.
16:51So thank you for bringing something in which is so dark and terrifying, but is a record of part of
16:59our history.
17:05Originally built in 1610 for Sir Thomas Vavasour, Ham House, as we see it today, was largely the creation of
17:13an enterprising courtier, William Murray, and his rather shrewd daughter, Elizabeth, Duchess of Lauderdale.
17:21They transformed Ham into one of the grandest Stuart mansions in England, with an impressive entrance hall and richly decorated
17:30interiors.
17:32This long gallery with its dark wood panelling was used for exercise, sashaying up and down on rainy days, playing
17:41games, showing off family connections with its portraits on the walls, or housing precious treasures from all over the world.
18:00And peeking in here, this little jewel of a room was remodelled by William Shilf, his collection of miniatures.
18:07It's a very rare survival of what's called a cabinet room of the 1630s, and it was meant to be
18:14enjoyed by candlelight.
18:26And here we have what's thought to be Britain's oldest teapot, Chinese, dating from the 17th century, and it was
18:33given to Elizabeth, the Duchess of Lauderdale.
18:36Tea was very expensive, and it was drunk by the lady of the house with her female friends in the
18:42intimacy of the bedchamber or the closet.
18:46And it was the privilege of the lady of the house to pour the tea, which is where the expression,
18:50shall I be mother, comes from.
18:52And this teapot would be heated up on an open fire, and then I have to use a glove to
18:57do this.
18:57The stopper here was put in the spout to help the water boil more quickly.
19:05Today, Ham House is owned by the National Trust.
19:08And just like the house, its gardens were designed to impress, too.
19:12More about those later.
19:13But for now, back to our experts to see what they've got brewing.
19:20Do you know, I'll be perfectly honest with you, this isn't really the sort of picture I'd want hanging in
19:25my own home.
19:25It's not really the sort of subject or style of picture that I like.
19:29But I can't help appreciating the kind of realism, the kind of almost photographic beauty of this painting.
19:36And I can see that it's signed E. Vernon, which is Emile Vernon, a Frenchman, 1911.
19:44Tell me where you got it from.
19:46I remember it hanging on a wall when I was about five years old.
19:52It was my mum that rescued it from a place that we were living in.
19:58She was a housekeeper and she basically cleaned the flats.
20:02And she went in one day and found a group of people throwing knives.
20:08Hold on a second. What? People were throwing knives at this picture?
20:12Throwing knives at that picture.
20:14So she asked the owner of this sort of fairly big mansion house, could she have it, as it was
20:19going to be thrown out.
20:20And so they said, yes, take it.
20:22So this is not a portrait in the true sense that it's a picture of somebody.
20:26It's Vernon's idealised representation of a beauty of the period.
20:30So we'll see, you know, if we look into her face, that really, actually, the quality of the way she's
20:36painted is quite amazing.
20:37She has this kind of ethereal, but beautifully accurate kind of depth.
20:42Almost kind of, how can I say, coquettish look.
20:45She really is very beautifully done.
20:48Now, Van Ault was, you know, he was a pretty prolific painter, to be honest with you.
20:53He painted a lot of portraits of this type and they were very, very popular.
20:57He was born in 1872, so he was painting in the 19th and early 20th century.
21:03In fact, he died in 1919, I believe.
21:06Okay.
21:06Looking at her, I can see that she has, in fact, got some repairs.
21:09These are kind of bits of repair that have been started.
21:13So can you tell me what went on here?
21:15Well, it wasn't until my wonderful husband sort of said how beautiful it was and he had a friend who
21:23was doing something in the way of restoring and said, have you got something?
21:27And he said, oh, actually, yes, we have.
21:29He is popular.
21:31It's not unusual for a picture like this to make £5,000.
21:36But we've got to consider the condition issues here.
21:41Yes.
21:41So I think she's going to be worth £2,000 to £3,000 at auction.
21:45Wow.
21:46Okay.
21:56I'm always intrigued by things wrapped in smart blankets.
22:00Well, I know what it is.
22:01Do you know what it is?
22:02Of course I know it's begun.
22:03That's why you had to wrap it up.
22:04Can't go around the street with it like that, can I?
22:07It's late 1700s.
22:09Mm-hmm.
22:10It's Turkey's Ottoman.
22:11Mm-hmm.
22:11It's a very distinctive stock.
22:14It's a flint block.
22:17Surprisingly enough, it comes up quite well, which is always a good idea.
22:20You know, these things are meant to be used, so they must be ergonomically quite good.
22:24Right.
22:25Even allowing for condition, erm, £600 to £800.
22:29Well, I'm very surprised at that, considering its state.
22:37Thank you for coming and bringing your lovely vases.
22:40Do you know anything about the objects at all?
22:43They belong to my paternal grandparents.
22:46Erm, so they came to me through my father when he died.
22:50And, erm, do you have any idea about where they could be from or, erm, what material?
22:56Well, I thought they might be bronze because they're very heavy.
23:00Yeah.
23:00My grandparents spent quite a lot of time in India.
23:05OK.
23:05But apart from that, er, you know, they don't look terribly Indian to me, but...
23:10They are in that direction.
23:12We are in Asia.
23:14Erm, but actually they are from East Asia, and particularly they're from Japan.
23:19Ah.
23:19They are bronze, and they date from the Meiji period, erm, which is the end of the 19th to
23:26the early 20th century, which is a period when Japan started opening up to the West, and
23:32they started exporting, and the, you know, their wonderful metal work started being recognised
23:38in Europe, where there actually was a frenzy for buying Japanese works of art.
23:44They are a pair, erm, but what is interesting is that they're not exactly the same pattern.
23:50Mmm.
23:50We here have swallows among this windy, cloudy environment, erm, with their little eyes, erm,
23:58down in gilt, which are a symbol of spring, er, in Japan.
24:04They have some little condition issues, but they are still, you know, very commercial, erm,
24:09nice, lovely pieces.
24:11And I would say, probably in the current market, we're looking at one to two thousand pounds.
24:19Really?
24:19Yeah.
24:20Wow.
24:22Well, that's, that's lovely.
24:24I don't think I'll be selling them though, because I really love them.
24:28I think they're absolutely beautiful.
24:45I love antique jewellery, and when I see a brooch like this in the box, it really gets
24:52to me, and when we look at this box here, to me, that looks a little bit like a kind
24:57of a horse's hoof.
24:59It doesn't look like a box from this country.
25:01It looks like a European box, just in its style and in its construction.
25:07But, of course, when we reveal what's inside the box, it does it full justice, doesn't it?
25:12What an absolutely fantastic garnet bracelet that is.
25:18You were going to tell me something about the actual place where you think it may have
25:24come from originally.
25:25Apparently, my great-great-grandmother was left them by her mother-in-law, and her mother-in-law
25:34had, or somebody in her family before that, had bought them from the Swedish royal family
25:40sometime during the 19th century, apparently.
25:43And they've become known as the crown jewels in our family.
25:46Quite justifiably.
25:48Yeah.
25:48These are garnets though, really, of a very deep blood red colour.
25:53Now, that gemstone, the garnet, is quite a popular stone.
25:57In the 19th century, you get it in jewellery in Germany, in Czechoslovakia, and it would
26:04be quite normal to assume that you'd also get this kind of stone set in jewellery in,
26:10perhaps, Stockholm, you know, in Sweden.
26:14Now, we can't confirm for certain about the royal connection, can we?
26:18No.
26:18It's family hearsay.
26:20Yes.
26:20Look at the garnets, first of all.
26:22You'll see that they're all faceted individually.
26:26You've got these pear-shaped stones at the side of the frame, smaller ones in towards the centre,
26:31and then the cabochon cut right in the middle.
26:35These are called pyrope stones, but they're garnets of a particular density of colour,
26:41and that's what makes them so beautiful.
26:43Now, with all those garnets, the one that really dwarfs them all is this massive faceted garnet
26:51in the middle of the bangle, in a border of little half-pearls, and then you've got some
26:58little drops for the ears here.
27:00Quite often with this kind of jewellery, the settings, the gold mounts, are actually quite low-grade gold.
27:07So it's kind of, if you like, nine-carat gold mountings, which sort of doesn't really do justice to the
27:13sheer expanse and beauty of the set.
27:16Do you wear this at all?
27:19I can't wear the bracelet. It's a bit small, and therefore quite wide and quite uncomfortable.
27:24And I've never had an occasion where I've needed something that splendid.
27:30Total value for this set, £4,000 to £5,000.
27:34That's fantastic. Wonderful. Thank you very much.
27:41This is actually remarkable, this carving on the back of this chair.
27:45I mean, the detailing is actually quite incredible.
27:49So, you've got a throne-like chair, so where do you keep this?
27:53Well, it's always been in the sitting room, because actually it's very comfortable to sit in.
27:58But, as you can see, it's looking a little bit worse for wear, let's put it that way.
28:02Much loved.
28:02Much loved, much loved.
28:04I've just noticed something as well.
28:07On the, it looks like this book here, it's got goldsmiths.
28:11The chair belonged to my grandfather.
28:12I don't know whether he bought it or whether he inherited it.
28:16And the family story is that it was made for Oliver Goldsmith out of the wood of a tree that
28:22he was very fond of sitting underneath.
28:24Now, I have no provenance, I have no idea whether any of that is true, but that is the family
28:30story.
28:30Oliver Goldsmith, he was quite an important character.
28:36He was a very well-known and respected 18th century poet.
28:40But when he came to London, he was very much in the social circles.
28:46He was great friends with Sir Joshua Reynolds, the artist.
28:49And it's being portrayed here of his importance.
28:54And he's from Ireland.
28:55Yes.
28:56So underneath his head here, you've got shamrock.
29:01I've never seen that before.
29:03It's made out of walnut.
29:04Right.
29:05And when you see a walnut chair of this scale, the period which shouts to me is Victorian.
29:14Right.
29:16So he died in 1774.
29:18So I would say this is 1874 or 1880s.
29:22It's the latter part of the 19th century.
29:26And I think this was mostly made to celebrate his death.
29:30When we look at the piece from a side view, you've got this wonderful, strong, X-shaped base.
29:37And a turned column support there.
29:39So it's all there to give the whole thing strength and structure.
29:43So I'd like to have it restored and re-upholstered to give to my son.
29:48Yes, of course, have it upholstered so it's fit for purpose.
29:52Value.
29:54It's worth, in this condition, between £600 and £800.
29:58If it was an 18th century chair, it would be many, many thousands.
30:02But it is a Victorian piece of furniture.
30:04But please, get it upholstered and make it look beautiful again.
30:07Oh, and they will really enjoy it.
30:09Whereas if it was worth a lot more, I think they'd be worried about it.
30:13Right.
30:13So it can go into their flat and they can enjoy it.
30:16All right, thank you.
30:26It's that time in the programme where one of our experts has a challenge for us.
30:31We are playing Spot the Fake.
30:33Now, Serhat, you have brought along three, what look like lovely pieces of porcelain.
30:39Yeah.
30:39One of them is fake.
30:41So tell us more.
30:42They're all from the Cerve factory, or purporting to be from the Cerve factory.
30:47So Cerve, a French manufacturer founded in 1740, and it was to rival Meissen of Germany who'd been producing since
30:561710.
30:56And the French wanted their very own excellent producer of porcelain.
31:01So let me take you through them.
31:03The first piece, small cream jug, that purports to be from the 1830s.
31:09And what is a pattern that was only used in the 1760s doing on a piece that's supposed to be
31:17from the 1830s?
31:19So could that be the fake?
31:21Next up, the vase in the middle.
31:24Looks very contemporary.
31:26Love that.
31:27The shape is Art Deco.
31:29But that decoration is a crystalline glaze that's zinc and silica put together to create this beautiful finish.
31:38But it was used in the 19th century, that's when it was developed.
31:41So why is somebody putting a 19th century technique onto an Art Deco vase?
31:48Could that be the one that's not real?
31:52Okay.
31:55Finally, a vase and a cover here.
31:58Now this is what Cerve were really good at in the 18th century.
32:01A bleu lapis ground, this dark blue, and then around the sides on the lid embellished with faux jewels.
32:08So little bits of porcelain made to look like semi-precious stones.
32:13Cerve was owned by the crown.
32:15And on the front, we have a portrait of Louis XVI.
32:20This would have been one of a pair.
32:22And the counterpart would have had his wife's portrait.
32:25Marie Antwilet of Let Them Eat Cake fame.
32:28It's marked on the bottom with the letter I.
32:31And I is for 1762.
32:34And it's got the painter's mark for André Vincent Veillat.
32:40Fully marked.
32:41It's got everything going there.
32:43But was it an invitation that was made later?
32:46Has someone faked this piece?
32:48So, basically, what we've got then is two items where the decoration does not go with the period that you
32:55are saying these things would have been made in.
32:57Yes.
32:57And then you've got one at the end which is an absolute slam dunk.
33:00That's what Cerve should be.
33:01And everything about it is right.
33:02So, therefore, it must be the fake.
33:04I mean, is what I'm thinking.
33:06Right.
33:09Let's get some help.
33:10Does anyone know about porcelain?
33:13Me.
33:14Right.
33:15What do you think?
33:17What do you think is the fake?
33:17I agree with you.
33:19I think the one that we would think isn't the fake is the fake.
33:22Yes.
33:23What do you think?
33:24Oh.
33:26Do you agree?
33:28I think it might be that one.
33:29And what makes you think that?
33:30I'm not sure.
33:31It just doesn't look quite right.
33:35What about you?
33:35What do you think?
33:36I would go for the one on the very end.
33:39The little cream jug being the fake.
33:42So, I'm going to go with the consensus.
33:44But we all think he's doing a double bluff, don't we?
33:47So, we're going to say that that's the fake.
33:50That one there.
33:50Are you sure?
33:51No.
33:52Oh, okay.
33:55You're right.
33:59Let me take you through these two first as well.
34:01That little cream jug is dated.
34:03Actually, the mark is incised.
34:05So, someone's pushed into the wet porcelain and added a date on it.
34:09So, we know it's November 1829.
34:13It's in the archive books.
34:14They only produced a handful of that shape.
34:17And they all had different designs.
34:19And yes, that glaze is from the late 19th century.
34:23But, Sevres were very good at trialling new shapes with old techniques.
34:29It's fully marked on the base.
34:30And it's completely fine.
34:32It's...
34:33It's...
34:33It's real.
34:34This vase, however...
34:36This presumably was made to deceive, then?
34:38Yes, it was.
34:40This is made in the 19th century, around 1870.
34:43But if we think about what's on the bottom and what is said,
34:46the date code I, 1762.
34:50Who was on the throne?
34:51Louis XV, not Louis XVI.
34:54We knew that, didn't we?
34:56And this portrait was painted by Callow, oil on canvas, in 1786.
35:04The dates just don't add up.
35:07It still has a decorative and antique value,
35:10but we can't call it Sevres.
35:12So what are we talking value-wise, then?
35:15For a pair, decorative antique value, 2,000 to 2,500.
35:19If it was the real thing, we're talking 20,000 to 25,000 pounds.
35:24Wow.
35:25The crystalline vase, 3,000.
35:27And the small jug, 750.
35:30Very good.
35:31We had to work for that.
35:32Thanks, Serhat.
35:46We have a chunk, and we have the letters L, V.
35:50Now, come on, tell me who made this, then.
35:54Louis Vuitton.
35:55OK.
35:55How did you get hold of this?
35:57It was bought by my father for me as a present to put in my first flat.
36:02He went to St Margaret's to a little junk antique shop, and he came back with that, which he bought
36:09for 12 pounds.
36:10Gosh.
36:11OK.
36:12It's certainly been through the walls, hasn't it?
36:14It certainly has.
36:15It's had a life.
36:16Yeah.
36:17Yeah.
36:17As one would expect.
36:18I mean, in many ways, trunks like this for me sort of talk about the history of travel in some
36:23aspects as well.
36:24So we might have had the sort of domed trunks of the 18th century that you put on a carriage
36:28or a coach or something like that.
36:30And one of Louis Vuitton's great innovations was the flat-top trunk, which could be stacked in the new railway
36:35carriages.
36:37Then bang, along came the aeroplane.
36:39Yes.
36:39Heavy.
36:40Large.
36:42Yeah.
36:42Kind of killed it for this sort of piece of luggage.
36:45So Louis Vuitton, founded in 1854, great name, great heritage and prestigious name.
36:52But let's look inside.
36:54So we've got this tray here with some webbing and then more webbing underneath.
36:59You've got a much more standard trunk here.
37:02But really, collectors look for the wardrobe trunks or those pieces that were really made for very special customised reasons.
37:11Where does it live now?
37:12It lives in my flat at the moment.
37:15We just have it in the corner.
37:17At the moment it's covered up as well.
37:19Why is it covered up?
37:21Because the fabric is, you know, Louis Vuitton.
37:23I know.
37:23We foster cats, so we have to keep them away from the trunk.
37:28Otherwise it would have more character than it's already got.
37:31So it's got typical sort of quality Louis Vuitton construction.
37:35We've got the printed fabric, of course, here.
37:37And then we've got these beach wood batons running across the front and then the banding all over it in
37:43these very strong metal corners.
37:45You know, this was a trunk that was made to last and keep things safe and sure inside.
37:49So my feelings are it's probably 1920s or 30s.
37:54Have you noticed there's a number on the lock round here?
37:57Yes, yes.
37:58If you get in contact with Louis Vuitton, they'll be able to tell you when it was sold.
38:02Ah, OK. I'll do that. Yeah, yeah.
38:05And they might even have recorded perhaps who it was sold to or what it was for.
38:11You paid 12 whole pounds or your dad paid 12 whole pounds?
38:15He did.
38:16OK.
38:173,000 pounds?
38:18Wow.
38:20It's rather nice.
38:24It's going back where it was though.
38:27Covered up still?
38:28While we've got a cat.
38:30While there's no cats, we'll uncover it.
38:37Fascinating.
38:38I'm definitely going to email Louis Vuitton with the serial number and see if I can find out where it
38:42started life.
38:44Very nice valuation.
38:45£12 to 3,000.
38:47Can't complain.
38:58Thank you so much for bringing this incredibly romantic view of the Amalfi Coast from Salerno.
39:03It's a beautiful oil painting.
39:05How did you come by it?
39:06I inherited it only last year, though my parents died some time ago.
39:10And it came down through my father's side of the family who were Italians.
39:13So there's a good Italian connection there.
39:16I think it's by the artist Johann Georg Mellin, although it's not signed.
39:21He's best known, particularly in the 1830s and 1850s, for these beautiful coastlines.
39:27He was born in Rome and lived and worked in this area.
39:32These scenes were particularly popular with European travellers.
39:35So you do often get more than one version of the same image.
39:39And I think this is a particularly beautiful one.
39:41There's an enormous amount of detail.
39:42Is there anything here that strikes you?
39:45Well, I haven't had as much of a look at it for years and it was always hung in a
39:49rather dark spot.
39:50So it's only now that I've been able to have a better look at it.
39:53And I do particularly like these two little figures at the top here.
39:56And the more you look at it, the more you see.
40:00It's absolutely delightful, isn't it?
40:01I think it's probably dusk.
40:03And you've got this beautiful golden light and these wonderful shadows
40:06that are picked up in the buildings and in the landscape here.
40:09And a view of Mount Vesuvius in the background.
40:12There's a lovely label on the back that I think qualifies the attribution.
40:16But I am going to be a little bit cautious.
40:18I would suggest we're probably talking something in the region of 15,000 to 20,000.
40:26But I would like to keep you in the family as it is a family piece.
40:30Absolutely.
40:30Well, I think it's beautiful.
40:35Well, these are really nice items that you've brought me here.
40:39They're nice examples of things from Melanesia and Polynesia.
40:43So tell me how you come to be the custodian of these pieces of tribal art.
40:47When I was 16, a dear friend of mine gave me this
40:51because I sort of was intrigued by it.
40:54And the story they told me was that their ancestor was on the boat of Captain Cook
41:01who went to Fiji in 1774, I think if memory serves me right.
41:05And this was brought back.
41:06But, of course, I have absolutely no proof of that.
41:09This one was at an auction and I paid four pounds or something.
41:15Four pounds.
41:15And then the bowl I bought in the 1970s and that cost me certainly under 10 pounds.
41:22What do you think about all these things?
41:25I absolutely love them.
41:27Our house is stuffed full of things like this.
41:31So we're passionate about all this.
41:34Well, it's, you know, honestly, you feel like kindred spirits in a way.
41:37So this is called a gun stock, but I don't think it's got anything to do with rifles,
41:43although that's how it's been named by collectors today.
41:46It's made from very heavy wood called iron wood.
41:50And that could easily be of or before the time of Captain Cook.
41:55This is called a Totokia, otherwise known as a pineapple club for obvious reasons.
42:00And they've been stone cut.
42:02So we know they're early, both of these.
42:04Well, this is the pièce de résistance.
42:07Oh, really?
42:07To me.
42:08Absolutely.
42:09This is a collector's dream.
42:12You'll find few of these around the world.
42:15Where I go to see the one I've always coveted is in the Courtauld,
42:20in Roger Fry's collection.
42:22And he was an art critic and painter around about the turn of the 19th, 20th century.
42:28And he was the first one to bring the awareness of modern art to Great Britain.
42:32I used to go there to the Courtauld and almost draw, looking at one of these.
42:38This bowl is amazing.
42:41Amazing patina, amazing carving.
42:44It's from Melanesia, as you know, from Admiralty Islands,
42:48which is about 250km north-east of PNG, Papua New Guinea.
42:53And it's obviously utilitarian because it's a bowl,
42:57but its zoomorphic form obviously suggests that it's ritualistic or for ceremony.
43:04They're usually made from a wood called piru wood.
43:07This is certainly 19th century, if not earlier.
43:11I mean, this and this could have been brought back by Captain Cook.
43:15Oh, wow.
43:15To value the clubs, I'll do them together.
43:18I would value at these to three and a half to 4,000.
43:23Wow.
43:24I mean, these clubs are very common, but this is a nice example and it's old.
43:28This, I would value at auction at 20,000 to 30,000 pounds.
43:33Oh, my God. You're joking.
43:36That's incredible.
43:40I'm shaking.
43:41This is out there.
43:43Wow.
43:44I was blown away when you got this out.
43:46And I promise you, I have been back to the court hall dozens and dozens of times
43:51just to look at Roger Fry's example, which is not as fine as this.
43:56You really have taken my breath away.
43:59I'm totally, totally lost for words. I really am.
44:02I thought it might be worth between, I don't know, 700 and 1,000 or something,
44:09but that is beyond my wildest dreams.
44:24I've just stepped away from the house for a minute to explore the gardens.
44:28And when Ham House was first built, it was surrounded by countryside,
44:32including 30 acres of turnip fields.
44:34So when you came here from the city, you really would have felt you were getting away from it all.
44:41The gardens were designed with wide avenues and walkways,
44:45where ladies of the house could promenade in private.
44:50And the hedges in this part of the garden were designed to be cut at five foot two inches tall,
44:55or thereabouts, so that members of the household, friends, lovers, who knows,
45:01could come here and meet without being seen.
45:04And people, of course, were quite a bit shorter back then.
45:08The wilderness garden was shaped like a union flag with eight smaller enclosed gardens.
45:14You could come here to get a sense of being in a secluded wooded glade.
45:22This wonderful kitchen garden would have fed the entire house,
45:25growing over 35 different ingredients for salads alone.
45:30It was all designed to impress your visitors, to show off.
45:35A bit like some of our experts.
45:52It's a dressing gown, but it can't be just a dressing gown,
45:58because you've brought it to the Antiques Roadshow.
46:00So, what's the story? Who does it belong to?
46:04So, it belonged to my grandfather.
46:07So, my great-grandfather, he got this dressing gown from a German prisoner of war that he captured,
46:15because he was on the front line and he went in the night to capture the Germans and bring them
46:22back to base.
46:23And he captured this one German prisoner of war, who was obviously a tailor before coming into the war.
46:30And then he said to my grandfather,
46:34Oh, you look cold. Would you like a dressing gown?
46:36And he said, Yeah.
46:37And then he gave him some blankets and a parachute cord.
46:42And then the next morning he had this dressing gown on his bed.
46:46Did he wear it when he came home?
46:49Yep, he did.
46:50He wore it for quite some years.
46:53And it was, I think, replaced about 1980s for the new dressing gown.
46:59And I can see from the other pieces that you've brought along,
47:03that he was actually in the reconnaissance corps.
47:06Yeah.
47:06Which was quite an elite division.
47:09And their job was to go out, checking what was happening ahead of their unit.
47:15We've got a great photograph here of your great granddad and granddad.
47:19And we can see that he's a lance corporal.
47:23And interestingly, he's got a sort of a bulge here in the arm,
47:26which would have been his soldiers service pay book that he's got here.
47:31And also his blazer badge.
47:36Yeah.
47:37Which looks like he's sort of taken it off his blazer.
47:39He literally cut it off the blazer.
47:43And then it was just in amongst all of the other things that came with everything that we have with
47:50the dressing gown.
47:52Now we come to the difficult bit.
47:54And because it's so personal to you, I know you don't want to sell it.
47:58And I know that you've got a little original photograph of him.
48:02And it's so lovely with sets of medals to have the original recipient's photograph.
48:07Yeah.
48:07I would say between £200 and £300.
48:10With regards to the dressing gown, there's no great value to it,
48:15but it's something that you absolutely cherish and remember him when you look at it.
48:19Thanks for bringing it along.
48:34Thank you so much for bringing this gorgeous arts and crafts speaker to the Roadshow today.
48:39Tell me why you decided to bring it along.
48:42It's from Felicity Ashby and I was named after her.
48:46She was a great family friend and has great sentimental value for me.
48:50It's already a fantastic object because the hallmarks tell us it was made by the Guild of Handicrafts in 1905.
48:57And Charles Robert Ashby was designing silver for the Guild of Handicrafts.
49:02So the beaker is here.
49:04It's a flared rim and it's got hammered sides.
49:07And that's really in keeping with the ethos of the arts and crafts.
49:10And it's inscribed here with a nursery rhyme.
49:14So the additional interest that this nursery rhyme adds, I think at auction you'd be looking at somewhere around £3
49:22,000.
49:23We would never, never, never leave the family.
49:26It's too precious.
49:34So it's pretty chill here at Ham House in West London today.
49:39But the lot of items that you've brought along conjures up a very different kind of Wild West.
49:44Can you tell me a little bit about them and how you came to have them?
49:47I was actually looking at an auction and waiting for an item I wanted to bid on.
49:52And these come up and I thought they looked quite interesting.
49:55So I put a bid in and luckily enough I won them.
49:58And so I brought them along here today to find out a bit more.
50:01They are kinds of photographs and this particular photographic process is called tintype or ferrotype photography.
50:09If you take a closer look you can see that this is in fact a very thin sheet of iron.
50:15The plate of iron is lacquered with a black lacquer and then it is dipped in a collodion solution
50:22which when it reacts with light in the camera turns a kind of silver colour.
50:26What this produces is essentially a kind of negative.
50:31But because the reactive substance turns silver it gives the appearance of a positive image.
50:35It was particularly taken up in the 1850s in America.
50:39So you see a lot of tintypes in America that because it's such a portable technology are being wheeled around
50:47the American frontier.
50:49And it means you get to see these amazing faces that otherwise just feel like they would be lost to
50:55history.
50:55If you turn this one over there is a little note stuck to the back and it says 1867 Jesse
51:04James.
51:05What does the name Jesse James mean to you?
51:08Not an awful lot other than he was just an outlaw in the Wild West.
51:11So Jesse James is a pretty famous name and there is the kind of dime novel Hollywood version of him
51:20which tends to romanticise him.
51:22But in reality Jesse James was a pretty brutal guy.
51:26And during the American Civil War he acted as something called a bushwhacker which was a confederate aligned kind of
51:33guerrilla fighter.
51:33So he's all around a nasty piece of work.
51:37So there's maybe half a dozen images that are genuinely authenticated as being Jesse James without question.
51:45I would say that the label on the back looks like a 20th century hand to me.
51:51So it's possibly a bit of wishful thinking on someone's part.
51:56Unfortunately what he doesn't have is Jesse James's brow, his facial structure or really kind of the height of Jesse
52:07James.
52:08Let's talk about the value.
52:10As a collection I'd say you've got a couple of hundred pounds here.
52:15Right.
52:16Do you want to know what it would be worth if it was Jesse James though?
52:20Yes I'd like to know.
52:22If it were unquestionably Jesse James I'd imagine that the bidding would open at 20,000 pounds.
52:29Right.
52:32Saying it's not him.
52:34Thank you so much for bringing them along.
52:36This has been a really really fun thing to look at.
52:49For centuries Britain and China have had a long history of trade.
52:53As well as more contentious periods of war and political upheaval.
52:57Which has resulted in rare Chinese treasures washing up on our shores and arriving at the roadshow.
53:05You have a piece of imperial Chinese porcelain in your house.
53:09That's a surprise.
53:11Occasionally an item can emerge from the most unlikely of places to leave even our experts stunned.
53:19There are those moments in your life that you will always remember and I will always remember standing here but
53:26I'll certainly always remember the first time that I saw this spectacular robe.
53:31I want to know everything that you know.
53:33Or was brought to the UK by Sarah's grandfather probably in the early 30s.
53:39And he was general manager of the Standard Bank in India.
53:43In Calcutta.
53:45In Calcutta.
53:45In Calcutta.
53:46Yes.
53:47I think he must have had it as a present.
53:49So have you always known about it?
53:51Where's it been?
53:53It was in the dressing up box.
53:54No.
53:56So did you wear it as a child?
53:58Yes.
53:58Oh yes.
53:59So look, 1750, it certainly would be imperial.
54:03It's a ladies robe.
54:05A robe of 1750 is a very rare robe indeed.
54:08I mean, there are a few survivors.
54:10The only other ones I know of this type, you'd have to go to Beijing and you'd have to go
54:13to the Palace Museum to see one of these.
54:15You know, it really is a sort of a museum item.
54:18Now, the colour is important and a bright yellow would be for the Empress or the Dowager Empress or the
54:25sort of first ranking concubine.
54:27This isn't a bright yellow.
54:28It's got a slightly kind of limey, just a slight green tinge to it.
54:32If you put that next to a sort of yellow imperial robe, you would see the difference.
54:37But it is certainly imperial.
54:38How do we know that?
54:38Well, we've got this lovely sort of gilded five claw dragon here.
54:42We've got these dragons chasing these wonderful kind of flaming pearls and these sort of flame scrolls and the crashing
54:49waves at the bottom.
54:50So there's a lot going on there.
54:52You know, spectacular thing.
54:53And then I've just got my little glove here because you mustn't touch these because you can with a little
54:57greasy hand stain the silk.
54:59And if I just pull that back, you've just got this wonderful rich red brocade inside there.
55:05I mean, it's just, it's just a fabulous thing.
55:07I just keep coming back to the condition.
55:09It is extraordinary.
55:12However, and there is a however, it does have a little problem.
55:15And that is, if you look at the dragon here, it wasn't intended to be sort of two-tone.
55:22What's happened there, I suspect, is that when they've mixed the sort of the gild on the copper wire, that
55:27actually the copper has oxidized, you see.
55:30And that is going to affect, ultimately, it will affect its value.
55:36Another thing I've noted, and I think that at some time, somebody's actually sort of turned up the bottom.
55:41I think it's probably a little shorter than it should be because I can see part of the, you know,
55:46the fringe here that actually maybe has just been sort of turned up as well.
55:50Just flip that around just so we can just have a look at the back, which is just as rewarding.
55:56I mean, it's just spectacular. And that decoration just continues.
56:00And that's sort of how we wanted to see, you know, that dragon on the front in that sort of
56:04perfect condition.
56:05If that comes up at auction, with the way the market is at the moment, I think that would make
56:11£200,000.
56:16Oh.
56:17Oh.
56:21Severely oh.
56:22That's surprising.
56:23Yes.
56:24Yes.
56:25Right.
56:26And I wouldn't be surprised if it made a bit more.
56:29Yes.
56:30My goodness me.
56:31Thank you very much.
56:33Well, we won't put it in the dressing up box again.
56:49Well, after a shock like that, I thought our visitors might need a bit of a sit down.
56:55So what did you think when Lee told you it was worth £200,000, maybe more?
56:59I don't know.
57:01Because it's...
57:01Staggered.
57:02Yes.
57:02Shocked.
57:03I think that when Lee was going on, it was getting more and more intense and how important it was.
57:10So now the decision what to do with it.
57:12So do you think you'll sell it?
57:13We don't know.
57:14Well, we're obviously not going to go on forever.
57:16And we've got a son and daughter.
57:19The daughter has seen it and wants to have it.
57:23So we might actually just pass the problem on to the next generation.
57:28Well, it's a very nice problem to have.
57:30I think you deserve a cup of tea after that.
57:32That's kind.
57:33Wow.
57:33What a great end to the roadshow.
57:34From the Antiques Roadshow.
57:36Bye-bye.
57:57Mhm.
58:01And now...
58:04If...
58:06You
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