Monthly Archives: December 2016
Season’s Bleatings
The setbacks and frustrations have been several this year; a few have been unavoidable due to health issues, but others could and should have been avoided. Of these, the year’s greatest disappointment has been the loss of the entire manuscript … Continue reading
Season’s Greetings
Whatever your persuasion and situation, I wish you all well during the festive season. Jack Plane
Signed, Sealed and (presumably) Delivered
An eighteenth-century Chinese imperial seal sold at Drouot’s in Paris on Wednesday for a record €21m (AU$29,751,239) – more than twenty times its pre-auction estimate. Eighteenth-century Qianlong steatite seal. (Drouot) The four-inch square seal, made of steatite, once belonged to … Continue reading
Sotheby’s Adopt Stiff Upper Lip
… and other body parts. Sotheby’s Old Masters staffers have tackled the #MannequinChallenge during the set up for their forthcoming exhibition in London on the 7th of December. Jack Plane
Picture This CI
I mentioned mahogany wake tables in A Wake back in January this year: At approximately twelve feet long and six feet wide, when open, could the massive wake table below have been commissioned for seeing off one of Ireland’s renowned … Continue reading
Picture This C
“All craftsmen make blunders, but what separates the truly great ones is the ability to redress their mistakes.” Regular reader, Burbidge, emailed me about an aspect of the mahogany linen press in figure 1. It conforms closely to the drawing … Continue reading
Pegs and 'Tails 