SPECIALIST:


CLARE DURHAM +44 (0) 1722 424 507 claredurham@woolleyandwallis.co.uk


OPPOSITE. A good Meissen plate from the Christie- Miller Service, c.1740, painted with a scene of figures before an Italian palace, a ship being laden at the quayside.


Estimate: £15,000 - 20,000


1. A rare Bow moulded sauceboat, c.1750, with a dragon handle.


Estimate: £1,000 - 1,500


2. A Sèvres teapot, c.1770, painted by Mme Pierre. Estimate: £1,000 - 2,000


3. A Bristol delftware tea canister, c.1765, painted with Chinese figures between hatched diaper panels.


Estimate: £1,500 - 2,000


4. A Vincennes cup and saucer, c.1750.


Estimate: £4,000 - 6,000


YEAR REVIEW We entered 2014 with a little trepidation about having four ceramic sales a year for the first time in seven years; would there be enough in the market to warrant doubling the number of sales from 2012? We’re delighted to report that there was and, thanks to the consignment of a good number


of private collections, the department has had a remarkably successful year in an area frequently described by the trade as “moribund”. That’s not to say it’s all roses around the door - 19th century English porcelains are substantially weakened, and the Majolica market has recently taken a blow - but good Continental porcelains are


buoyant, and high prices are being achieved for the earliest English porcelain factory wares and 18th and 17th century English pottery. With some exciting things already in the pipeline for the Spring sales we hope to be able to continue the four sales a year pattern for as long as possible.


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THE ‘CHRISTIE-MILLER’ SERVICE The plate on the facing page, made by Meissen around 1740, has come to be known as the Christie-Miller Service since Samuel Christie-Miller is said to have purchased some 72 pieces from a member of the Orleans family in 1840. The service was sold by his descendants at Sotheby’s in 1970, and a handful of pieces have reappeared on the market since that date. The former provenance of the service is not recorded, although Ulrich Pietsch has suggested, based on the sheer quality of the decoration, that it may have been ordered by Augustus III as a gift for the French Court.


Samuel Christy was an English businessman and politician, who became Christie-Miller by Royal Licence in 1862 after inheriting


Britwell Library in Buckinghamshire and its collection of rare books previously owned by William Henry Miller, a distant relative. Miller had been MP for Newcastle-under-Lyme and Samuel also stood successfully for the borough between 1847 and 1859. On his death in 1889, the service passed to Wakefield Christie-Miller whose descendants resided at Clarendon Park near Salisbury for many years.


FINE PORCELAIN & POTTERY | 15


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