Fantastic Howard Sofa and armchairs for auction this Wednesday 25/10

Post date: Oct 23, 2017 12:10:53 PM

Been meaning to talk about these for a while but have not had the time, I am really excited about this Beckett sofa coming up at Lyon and Turnbull, Edinburgh. It has 57 people watching it on the-saleroom and a further 5 on invaluable so it has obviously caught a lot of peoples eye, and I can see why. This really should be in a museum or William Morris's Cotswold home. As a huge William Morris fan I would love to see it kept with the fabric on but I appreciate it is old and dirty, may not even be original so would understand if it got recovered (hopefully in more William Morris!). If I had the money I would be there bidding high and I would expect to pay in the region of £10,000 and I would not be surprised to see it go well past that. Fantastic item. Sold for £11,000 + the 25% commission and vat on the commission takes it to £14,300.

There is also a very nice Howard centre table at the same sale which sold for £2600 + commission.

On the same day we have three very nice armchairs at Dreweatts, Newbury.

Three nice chairs, my personal favorite is the third but then that is possibly the William Morris print and the turned legs. I would expect that one to sell for around £2000. Sold for £2600 + Commission.

The Bridgewater in the middle needs some work to the back, someone has obviously made a bit of a hash of it at some point, I would expect it to make the usual £2500-£3000. Sold for £3000 + Commission.

The top one I think is an Ingleby with ball and claw feet, could look very nice restored, I would expect it to be the cheapest of the 3, probably just under £2000. Sold for £800 + Commission.

There is also a Howard nursing chair which I am sure will sell for the standard £400-£500 Sold for £1300 + Commission. Click the pictures for a link to the relevant page on the-saleroom.com

Post sale thoughts: I was not far out with most of my price estimates, the one I was most surprised by was the nursing chair making significantly more than the Ingleby. The Ingleby was a bargain at that price but I don't think I have ever seen a nursing chair make anywhere near that price before, they normally make half that at best. The Beckett sofa certainly did me proud, I had a doubting Thomas here in the workshop who was sure it would not go past £6,000. I hope it is going to a good home.