1. A box of surprises
Estimate £4,000–£6,000 Sold £37,760
Back in the day, a nécessaire was part of a lady’s toilette, placed on a dressing table or desk for her daily use. Inside the elaborate box were scent bottles and manicure tools, perhaps a pen and a tablet, with rings or pins stored in little drawers at the bottom. This 18th-century example, which sold at Christie’s The Collector: London sale, looks like it is made from agate but is in fact painted rock crystal, with agate feet and finial. The five-inch piece dating to 1760 is finished with luxuriant gold mounts sporting baroque-style scrolls, shells and flowers, and the interiors are lined with salmon-pink silk. Christie’s antique boxes specialist, Isabelle Cartier-Stone, explains that while she couldn’t attribute it to a maker without firm evidence, two clients assessed the nécessaire to potentially be the work of James Cox, a celebrated British jeweller and metalworker who specialised in lavish objets de vertu (a range of his work is in the Royal Collection, brought together by Queen Mary in the early 20th century). The piece had interesting provenance, too, having come from the estate of Sir John and Lady Clare Keswick of Portrack House in Dumfries. Their daughter, the late Maggie Keswick Jencks, who also lived at Portrack House, was co-founder of Maggie’s cancer care centres along with her husband Charles, the well-known landscape designer. The bijou box quickly rose in price as two bidders battled it out to claim the trophy.
