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The Easton Neston
House Sale
Easton Neston, in Northamptonshire, has
always been prized for the treasures it
contains as much as the splendour of its
architecture. But next week, under the
instruction of Lord and Lady Hesketh and
the Trustees of Frederick, 2nd Baron
Fermor-Hesketh, more than 1,000 of these
will go under the hammer.
Rare: Hawksmoor's oak model of Easton
Neston
This auction by Sotheby's has generated
much excitement, and with good reason:
among the 1,500 lots will be portraits by
Reynolds and Kneller, silver by Storr and
Parker, and furniture attributed to
Chippendale and Cobb. An 18th-century
account of the house states that the
"collection would take one a whole summer
to study and observe with pleasure".
Sotheby's has set aside four days (May
13-16), so what to look out for?
Be sure not to miss the rare pair of
plaster busts in the entrance hall, which
are among only a handful of surviving
works by Peter Besnier, the sculptor to
Charles I. They have been given an
estimate of £40,000 to £60,000,
but should make more - and deserve to
attract the interest of museums.
Large canvases and a runway of a dining
table dominate the dining-room, but it is
a bronze jug, just 12in-high, that should
provide most excitement here. Lord
Wenlock's Tankard, which dates from the
1300s or 1400s, has an estimate of
£60,000 to £80,000, but could
make £250,000.
An unusual aspect of this collection is
the fine assembly of Chinese and Japanese
works of art. A pair of Ming dynasty
bronze lion dogs (£3,000 to
£5,000) that once stood on the
dining-room chimneypiece would grace any
collection.
And a charming Japanese tortoiseshell
box in the form of a fish will easily
surpass its £500 to £600
estimate.
The gallery at Easton Neston is hung
with family portraits, some more gruesome
than others, but do take in those of Sir
George Fermor and his wife, Mary - a
wonderful survival from the late 16th
century. Rarer still is the oak model of
Easton Neston by Nicholas Hawksmoor, circa
1690. At £80,000 to £120,000, it
is cheaper than the real thing (on the
market through Knight Frank with an asking
price of £18 million) and the most
complex of any model to survive from this
period. Bidding could, therefore, get
intense. A cheaper alternative is the
charming late 19th-century watercolour by
Peace Sykes depicting a country house in
parkland (£800 to £1,200).
The contents of the billiard room
include an unusual pair of upholstered
armchairs comprising amboyna wood, which
would look fantastic if sympathetically
restored (£6,000 to £8,000).
Among the plethora of family silver and
porcelain is an elegant late 18th-century,
neoclassical silver coffee pot
(£1,500 to £2,000), a 34-piece
porcelain dessert service by Minton
(£300 to £400), and an
intriguing gilt-metal pipe with a pierced
spherical end, which is dated 1890 and
turns out to be an opium pipe (£100
to £150).
Surprisingly, the family is selling the
early 19th-century gilt-metal coronet of
the Earls of Pomfret. At £1,000 to
£1,500, this is sure to attract
interest, not least from fancy-dress
regulars.
There will also be plenty to excite
bargain-hunters - namely, vast quantities
of household linen, clothes by the likes
of Vivienne Westwood and Christian Dior,
kitchen and bedroom furniture, sewing
machines, picnic hampers, 800 terracotta
flowerpots, four pairs of iron canons, a
quantity of ladders and a pond yacht…
all with estimates from £40 to
£600.
And if the projected final figure is
achieved early on, some of the
lesser-value lots may be sold without
reserve, while unsold lots from earlier
sessions might be re-offered. If the
family is willing to wave goodbye to 300
years of collecting, it's probably not
going to want to keep four old
wheelbarrows.
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