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It's Coronation Year year in early May and the organisers of The Petworth Park Antiques & Fine Art Fair have wisely moved to a slightly later time this year. The Coronation of Charles III is taking place on 6 May and with the subsequent bank holiday weekend, The Petworth Park Antiques & Fine Art Fair is now opening on Friday 19 to Sunday 21 May 2023.

All the usual arrangements for the fair will be in place - a purpose-built marquee will be set up in the Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown 400-acre deer park belonging to the National Trust’s Petworth House in Petworth, West Sussex to comfortably house the 60 plus exhibitors and catering with free parking for antiques fair visitors right outside.

“Since we started this Fair in the grounds of Petworth House, in 2015, we have had enormous support from the National Trust, the Petworth Business Association, Petworth Antiques And Decorative Arts association and local businesses, who really embrace our annual event and influx of visitors,” said organiser Ingrid Nilson of The Antiques Dealers’ Fair Limited. “A number of Petworth art and antiques dealers even exhibit within the fair, as well as putting on a superb display within their shops and galleries. With the courtesy bus we provide, it is easy for visitors to take full advantage of all that is on offer within the market town of Petworth and Petworth House whilst visiting our fair. Now that life has opened up again, since the pandemic, the National Trust has kindly restored welcoming antiques fair ticket holders, free-of-charge and we reciprocate by admitting National Trust members to the fair.

A newcomer to this year’s fair is W. Shanshan 珊然軒 amongst whose stock is a Han dynasty (206 BCE-220 BCE) Sichuan terracotta dancer 漢代川蜀舞女俑, £12,500 and a late Yangshao culture, Dahe Village painted pottery jar with white background 仰韶文化後期大河村彩陶罐, c.2500 BCE, £11,500. Returning to Petworth with Chinese porcelain is Santos London.

Petworth shops already signed up include Bear Petworth, Augustus Brandt and art galleries Ottocento and Rountree Tryon Galleries. Highlights on Rountree Tryon Galleries’ stand are The Old Slip, Newlyn an oil on canvas by Harold Harvey (1874-1941), signed and dated ’08, £52,000 and a Sussex View from Upperton towards Chanctonbury Ring, West Sussex signed oil on board by Claude Graham Muncaster (1903-1974), priced at £5,500.

Local to Petworth, glass specialist Fileman Antiques has a fine pair of Rockingham porcelain candlesticks with gilt decoration, hung with the most unusual spade drops and notch cut spangles, English, c.1830, £4,850. Rockingham porcelain was produced in two distinct periods. 1826-1830, the so called red-mark period, and 1831-1842, the puce-mark period. Rockingham was best known for its finely decorated and opulent rococo style porcelain. Orders from royalty lead to use of the subtitle ‘manufacturer to the King’ from 1831. On the subject of candlesticks, campaign furniture experts Christopher Clarke Antiques has a pair of American sterling silver Brighton buns travelling candlesticks, decorated with a Rococo design, circa 1870, priced in the region of £1,100. The dishes have gilt interiors and are marked ‘Sterling 66’. For travel the candle sconces are unscrewed at the base of their column, one has a screw thread and the other a threaded hole. They are placed in one dish with the other dish screwed onto it to form a bun shape, containing the sconces.

M&D Moir is coming with a signed Emile Gallé deeply cut cameo Primula vase, c.1908, £2,950; a rare Fachschule Haida vase with polychrome parrots, c.1915, £1,980 and an L.C. Tiffany Favrile vase, signed, c.1905, £2,200. Hickmet Fine Arts and Morgan Strickland Decorative Arts return with their 19th to mid-20th century glass, ceramics and sculpture. Tom Rooth exhibits art and his own hand drawn ceramic designs, amongst which is Octopus framed in an early 20th century ship’s porthole, £3,350. Garret & Hurst Sculpture exhibits with contemporary and 19th bronzes with a highlight being ‘Le Penseur’ by Julien Monier (French, fl. 1890-1915), £5,975.

William Cook returns with an important George III console table with the original marble top, £10,000. Other furniture specialists exhibiting include Jeroen Markies Art Deco, Walton House Antiques, Millington Adams, Mark Buckley Antiques and Hatchwell Antiques bringing a 1950's Olympic competition Baby-foot La National table by Tousjeux et Nouveautés of Geneva with frosted glass pitch, working pull rod mechanism for ball release and abacus scoring, £11,500.

Amongst the paintings for sale on Lucy B. Campbell’s stand is work by Sussex artist Anna Pugh (b. 1938) including Mists of Time, acrylic on board. The Swan Gallery brings paintings by Marcel Dyf and William Lee-Hankey’s The Goose Girl, oil on canvas, £22,000 and maps including ‘Hampshire, by C Saxton Corrected and many Additions by P Lea’ (amendment using the original Saxton plate of 1579), 1720, £2,400. Blackbrook Gallery returns with its naïve animal paintings, such as Proud Farmer with his prize Hereford Steer and Cotswold Ram, oil on canvas, signed and dated L Beattie 1833, £14,950.

Jewellery comes in several guises with Georg Jensen and other Scandinavian jewellery from Dansk Silver by Jane Burgett including an early twenties’ Georg Jensen silver grape vine leaf necklace, no 96, designed by Harald Nielsen, £1,750. Greenstein Antiques has an Art Deco diamond bracelet, £12,950 whilst Shapiro & Co. has an 18ct. gold, ruby and diamond pendant, c.1900, £6,750 and an 18ct gold Swiss quarter repeating pocket watch, c.1910, £3,250. Timewise Vintage Watches exhibits with an impressive selection of timepieces by Rolex, Patek Philippe, Cartier and other designer vintage pieces. Those seeking clocks are well catered for, as both BBC Antiques Roadshow clock expert Richard Price and Olde Time are exhibiting. Silver dealer J.H. Bourdon-Smith Ltd is exhibiting again joining regular silver specialist Stephen Kalms Antiques.

Admission to the fair is £10.00 each and can be booked through Eventbrite and includes complimentary access to Petworth House and Park over the three days. Free entry to the antiques fair for National Trust members.

For more information visit The Petworth Park Antiques & Fine Art Fair