Stennett-Willson started work in 1935, when he took a job as an office junior at a company that imported decorative glassware, mainly from Sweden. He got on well and developed a passion for modern glass. In 1951 he joined J Wuidart & Co, a Scandinavian importer, where he became sales manager.

He travelled to Sweden in the early fifties to see the glass being made there. It was a revelation – Sweden, as a neutral county, had been untouched by the war and by the early 1950s the people were rich and life was good. Selling the innovative Swedish glasswares to retailers in Britain was not easy. British glass was still much as it had been in the Victorian and Edwardian eras, colourless and with historic cut glass patterns.

Ronald decided that he needed to create hybrids that would give a British slant to Swedish colours and forms. His first design was a re-modelling of the classic Paris goblet. It was produced for 34 years in sold in the millions. Some of his more innovative pieces had to be made by Bjorkshult in Sweden, as many British glassworks refused to make his modern designs.

He went on to design hundreds of pieces of decorative and functional glassware and often consulted with retailers in order to make the most stylish pieces that would sell in the shops. Business boomed and Ronald was in great demand. While still running Wuidart in 1961 the Royal College of Art recruited him as a tutor. Here he met with some of the most pivotal figures in British post-war design, including Robert Gooden, David Queensbury, Robin Pye and Kenneth Grange.

Initially, the glass department had no furnace and the pieces had to be made in Stourbridge. Ronald supervised the installation of a furnace and 1967, the first step towards what was to become the British studio glass movement which created a huge interest in one-off statement pieces.

In 1963 he opened Choses, a modern Scandinavian lifestyle shop, in Hampstead. Here he sold Swedish and German ceramics, teak and pine furniture and blue and white striped butchers’ aprons. It became the place to be seen and anyone who was anyone would congregate there on a Saturday morning. One of the customers was Terence Conran, who is said to have been inspired by the use of wire shelving and backlighting and he opened Habitat the following year.

Ronald had a big break in 1967 when he managed to get financial backing to found his own glassworks at King’s Lynn – Lynn Glass. He initially employed 35 people, 15 of them were skilled Swedish glassmakers.

The most enduring Stennett-Wilson designs are his trio of candlesticks ‘Sheringham’, ‘Brancaster’ and ‘Sandringham’, all named after Norfolk villages. They were all handmade and Sheringham required each disc and stalk to be fitted together individually. When it was first launched in 1967 the nine ring model would have cost £22, which was about a week’s wages for the average person. These candlesticks continued to be produced even after Wedgwood took over the company in 1969. Wedgwood already owned Waterford and exported largely to the United States. Lynn Glass enabled them to offer contemporary designs in contrast to the traditional Waterford pieces.

In 1979 Ronald founded another glassworks, together with his former leading glassmaker, Paul Miller. He died in 2009 and the Langham glassworks are still going strong under Miller’s direction. Lynn closed in 1992 after Waterford bought out Wedgwood.

If you are interested in contemporary glass the good news is that Stennett-Willson pieces are not difficult to find. They were produced in large numbers and over several decades. You can pick up one of his re-designed wine glasses for a few pounds. The ‘Harlequin’ suites of glasses he designed for Lemington Glass in the 1960s can be had for around £25 each and the iconic ‘Sheringham’ candle stick usually goes for between £25 for a single to around £400 for the nine ringed version.

Ronald also made a limited number of studio vases using the ‘Ariel’ technique of trapping pockets of air beneath the surface. Most of these were signed and would cost between £400 – £1,500. Most of the designs are available at such good prices that they cost hardly more than imported modern Chinese pieces sold in the High Street. Owning a Stennett-Willson design means you have a little piece of British design history that will retain its value for a very long time.

In the early 17th century fine porcelain was worth a great deal of money, since European manufacturers had not yet discovered how to make it.  The King of Saxony, Augustus the Strong, was very taken with it and built a Palace in the Japanese style to house his collection.  As the King had spent a lot of money on this he needed to replenish the coffers and he had heard of an alchemist called John Böttger, who claimed he could turn metal into gold.  Bad mistake, the King imprisoned him and asked him to do just that.  Böttger was a quick thinker and offered to make ‘white gold’, as fine white porcelain was called, instead.  By 1710 Böttger had managed to crack the formula and Augustus built a new factory at Meissen.  Three years later the first white hard-paste European made porcelain went on sale.

Initially they made teapots, cups and Buddha-like figures, copied from Chinese and Japanese china.  As the European porcelain was expensive to make the decoration had to be impressive.  A painter employed at Meissen, J G Hörold, invented chinoiserie decoration which was more exotic than its Chinese counterpart.  He also painted tea sets with garden flowers, birds and landscapes, more familiar to the European customer.

In the 1730 J J Kändler started making porcelain figures to decorate the banqueting tables of great houses and palaces.  He was a brilliant sculptor and was able to make life-like figures of Chinese gods as well as ladies in crinoline dresses.  On your dining table you would often have a group of porcelain cows and sheep as well as more exotic animals.

People often wonder why there is such a fuss about Meissen china – it is the manufacture and decoration that makes it stand out.  Clay is very difficult to work with and collectors really appreciate the skill of the maker and decorator.  What collectors often don’t appreciate is the conditions under which the porcelain was made.  Workmen were kept as virtual prisoners and were not permitted to stray outside the ancient castle walls which surrounded the factory.  They were paid very low wages and many workers just though of excape and they plotted to take valuable secrets with them.  Some managed to get out and helped to establish rival factories across Germany.  Meissen was captured by invading Prussians during the Seven Years’ War (1756-63) and they lost almost everything.

In the latter part of the 18th century Meissen had competition from French as well as English manufacturers, but they grew rapidly in the 19th century and became extremely popular in Britain.  An entire section of the factory concentrated on making porcelain in ‘the English taste’ and they couldn’t make it fast enough, they sold in their thousands.

Meissen introduced its crossed swords mark in 1723 to stop other manufacturers from selling their inferior porcelain as Meissen.  The mark was widely copied and even great factories like Minton, Derby and Coalport used the crossed swords on pieces they sold as ‘English Dresden’.  After long legal battles the crossed swords is now a protected trade mark.  However, there are many fakes and you should only buy from a reputable dealer or auctioneer.

As we entered the 20th century Meissen’s traditional style lost some of its appeal and during the art nouveau and art deco periods they started making modern patterns and figures.  They only made a small number of figures and they are rare and expensive.  Meissen is still hand-decorated, which pushes up the price.  If you are interested in collecting it you can occasionally pick up a nice flower-painted cup and saucer for between £200 and £300.  If you like the 19th century cabinet pieces, they can cost anyting from £500 to £3,000.  While 18th century blue and white china is rare, it is not expensive and you could get it for around £150.  You might also want to look out for the post war productions of white porcelain or red stoneware made in the 1950s and 1960s and they go for anything between £40 and £400.

Try to get your piece of Meissen china in perfect condition and always examine it for cracks.  This is less important with Meissen figures where damage or repair doesn’t lower the value by much, you should avoid pieces with broken necks or missing limbs.  As always, a piece in perfect condition will always be worth more.

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The covers of the King Penguin series played a big part in the success of the series and some of the covers are little works of art.  One of the very popular ones is English Ballet printed in 1944, the trademark Penguin on the spine has been dressed up in a tutu.  The fact that a third of each book was taken up by illustrations and images and that there were well-produced plates, often in colour proved very popular with the readers.

The series first editor, Elizabeth Senior, was sadly killed in a London air raid in 1941 and Penguin appointed a young German refugee, Nikolaus Pevsner, as the new editor.  He recruited artists like Edward Bawden, John Piper and Barbara Jones to do the illustrations.  Their work is very collectable and if you want to collect King Penguin Books you should look out for Bawden’s Life in an English Village, Piper’s Romney Marsh and Jones’ Isle of Wight.

The topics covered sometimes bordered on the eccentric – The Leaves of Southwell, a study of the medieval carvings in the Chapter House at Southwell Minster, written by Nikolaus Pevsner with photographs by FL Attenborough, father of David and Richard, was beautifully produced, but Pevsner admitted himself that it had been a spectacularly bad seller.  The titles though seemed to matter less than the format of the books and people would buy titles they would not otherwise have read, because it was a King Penguin.

Although these books were written with children from age 12 upwards, they were nonetheless discussed in academic journals and even the American Shakespeare Quarterly gave a very favourable review to Elizabethan Miniatures, which was one of the best selling King Penguins of all times.

Unfortunately, rising production costs eventually put an end to the King Penguin series and the final title, The Sculpture of the Parthenon, was published in 1959.  King Penguins were published in large numbers and none of them are really rare, so it is not difficult to find them.  You should always find several in good second hand or antiquarian book shops.  If you are lucky enough, you might find a copy signed by the author or illustrator and that would push the value up a bit, but the good news is that King Penguins are very affordable.  They seldom cost more than £15 and most of them can be found for under £10.  You should expect to pay between £100 – £200 for a signed copy.  If you ever find a full set of all 76 titles it would probably cost somewhere between £600 and £700.

You should pay attention to the condition of the book and also whether it is a first edition or a reprint.  If you look on the back of the title page check whether it says ‘second’ or ‘revised’ edition.  If it does not, it is probably a first edition.  King Penguins printed after 1949 were issued with a paper dust jacket, identical to the cover, so you should check that it is present.  As always, check out your local car boot sales and auction rooms, as well as internet auctions and dealers.  Good luck in your hunt for King Penguin Books.

Murphy designed mainly pendants, brooches, rings and buckles in styles from Arts and Crafts to Art Deco.  The pieces were exquisite and stood out from the cheap, repetitive jewellery of the day, which consisted mainly of cheap diamond chipped rings and brooches.

In 1928 Henry George Murphy founded the Falcon studio and took up making silverware such as church plate, trophies and domestic items covering a range from tankards to egg cups.  His circular modernist coffee set won a gold medal at the Milan International Exhibition in 1933.  Murphy’s first passion though was jewellery and he produced some stunning earrings and necklaces in the Art Deco style.  He also produced a sizeable range of  inexpensive silver brooches, his zodiac and animal designs being particularly popular.

People often wonder why he was so successful in his day and we can probably put it down to the fact that he had a shop in central London, and that meant he had to be commercial and keep up with the changing fashions.  Also, there was nobody at the time who was producing jewellery or silverware that was as stylish or distinctive.  His jewellery was bright and colourful and his earrings were often of an architectural nature that reminded people of the modernist buildings in New York.

Murphy was a typical example of the fact that success does not necessarily equal wealth.  He often struggled with cashflow, probably due to the fact that his customers were slow in paying.  At the peak of production in the early 1930s he employed ten people who all needed to be paid.  It was quite a stressful existence, especially as some of his time was also spent lecturing at the Central School of Art, where he was appointed Head of silversmithing, as well as attending overseas trade events.

If you are interested in owning a piece of Henry George Murphy jewellery, you are not likely to find it at a car boot sale, but would have to visit a specialist dealer and his pieces are not for the cash-strapped.  The jewels you are most likely to find are his silver zodiac brooches, they would be about the size of an old penny and you would have to pay around £400, while a silver ring would cost between £500 – £800 and a pendant £1,000 – £1,500.  His gold pieces rarely appear on the market, but if you were to find one you should expect to pay between £2,500 and £5,000 for a Falcon Studio ring.  At the top end, a gold necklace or a pair of earrings would cost between £5,000 – £10,000, especially if they were in the original Falcon Studio green leather box.  His silver pieces are easy to identify as most bear both, the Falcon Studio mark and the monogram HGM, as well as the hallmark.  His gold jewellery is rarely marked, which makes identification problematic.

While Henry George Murphy was largely forgotten after the war when pre-war designers were not in favour, in 2005 there was a major retrospective of his life and work at Goldsmiths’ Hall in London.  This broadened Murphy’s appeal and prices are still rising.  He  produced several hundred items of jewellery between 1928 and 1939, and if you can afford to buy one it could prove a shrewd investment.

The first buttons in Britain were made in the Shaftesbury area of Dorset around 1620, they were made out of ram’s horn and covered with fabric and were then embroidered with undyed linen or cotton thread.  The buttons were stitched onto cards and were exported to Europe and America between the late 18th century and the middle of the 19th century, it was a very lucrative business.  Then, at the Great Exhibition in 1851, John Ashton exhibited a machine that could cheaply produce fabric-covered buttons and that was more or less the end of the demand for Dorset buttons.

Button making was now taken up by in the cities by the likes of Wedgwood, who turned out tiny cameos of jasperware for buttons.  The demand for more buttons was now driven by a change in fashion.  Until the end of the 18th century buttons had been made predominantly for men, while women used hooks and laces to fasten their clothes.  During the Napoleonic wars women began to ape men’s fashion and military style jackets became highly fashionable.  By the mid 19th century beautifully decorated buttons were the norm on ladies’ clothing and made a very nice gift.  Often, for a 21st birthday, a young lady was given a leather case, containing a set of six silver buttons, adorned with flowers, fruits, birds, leaves or geometric patterns.

Buttons such as these were not suitable for washing and they would have been attached with toggles so that they could be removed easily.  When the garment wore out the buttons would be removed and attached to a new dress or coat.  The Victorians found all kind of innovative ways for wearing their buttons, some sown onto bonnets or purses.

If you want to start collecting buttons, there is an enormous range and you might want to focus on a particular area.  British railway companies each produced their own button, with designs varying according to rank.  While the lower ranks wore white buttons, the management had buttons made of brass.

The prices for buttons vary – while you can have early Dorset buttons for less than £10 for half a dozen, Wedgwood buttons or any buttons relating to the French revolution can set you back several hundred pound.  Buttons made by particular firms like Bimini, which specialised in glass buttons or makers such as Lucie Rie are very collectable.  Lucie Rie worked for Bimini for a while but she also made pottery buttons under her own name.  As they were not marked they are very difficult to identify, unless you can get hold of the catalogue of her studio sale.

One of the great things about collecting buttons is their affordability, often they can be had for pennies.  You should try car boot sales, jumble sales, charity shops and internet auctions.  As with all collectables, there are the high-end items and you would have to pay considerable more for solid silver buttons or those made by a famous designer  In 2006 a set of dress buttons by Chanel, sold with matching cuff links, fetched £6,240 at auction.

As buttons are often unmarked they are difficult to identify and date, but you can get help with that from the British Button Society.  If you are interested in the history of buttons take a trip to Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery, they have an extensive selection of Birmingham made buttons and you might find some inspiration for collecting buttons.

While we often imagine the antique locket as a token between lovers, the 17th century brought another dimension.  It was not uncommon for people to wear a concealed locket containing the image of Charles I, to signal opposition to Cromwell.  In the following century the Jacobite supporters would wear hidden lockets of the young Pretender.

From the 1760s onward mourning lockets became fashionable.  Inside you would often find human hair belonging to the deceased, woven into complex basket patterns and often containing gold thread and seed pearls.  The heyday of the locket was the 19th century.  One of Prince Albert’s gifts to Queen Victoria was an enamelled bracelet with eight coloured heart-shaped lockets, each containing a lock of her children’s hair.  The fashion soon caught on and Victorian ladies wore their lockets on velvet ribbons or heavy gold chains.  In the 1870s large lockets were the fashion, in silver or gold.  Some were the size of matchboxes, while the children wore small heat shaped or round ones.

The advent of photography brought about a major change.  As the young men were going off to fight in the Boer war, they were presenting their sweethearts with lockets containing a photograph of themselves as a momentum.  Many lockets were now low grade and sold for a few shillings, meaning that they are not worth a great deal nowadays, other than sentimental value.  However, lockets from that period with enamel decoration, stones or pearl adornments increase the value and they would fetch between £400 and £750.

The popularity and demand for lockets also meant that the leading jewellers of the day, Cartier, Faberge, Garrard and Alexs Falize also made them, and an antique locket made by any of them would fetch a big price.  Heart lockets mounted with pave-set diamonds at the front and a solid dome of rock crystal at the back from the 1880s can fetch between £5,000 and £10,000.  There are also ‘regard’ lockets, so called because the stones, ruby, emerald, garnet, amethyst, ruby and diamond spell ‘regard’.  They are very sought after and you would have to pay around £1,000 plus.

If a locket contains an image of a famous person it can command a high price.  A plain locket brooch made for Queen Victoria to commemorate her favourite gillie, John Brown, was sold at Bonhams a while ago for £13,200.  A locket containing Nelson’s and Lady Hamilton’s hair, made in 1798, the year their affair started fetched £44,000 last year – the estimate had been £5,000.

Antique lockets containing images of unknown people usually command more modest sums and it’s all down to personal taste.

Lea Stein was born in Paris in 1931 and not much is known about her early life, other than that she initially worked for Coco Chanel before establishing her own textile design company in 1957.  The company started making buttons for the fashion industry and Lea’s husband developed a laminated coloured rhodoid, consisting of multiple, paper-thin sheets of cellulose acetate that could be inter-layered with materials like glitter to produce a stunning effect.  The layered sheets were then baked to harden and various shapes would be hand-carved.

Lea Stein launched her first range of costume jewellery in the late 1960s, consisting mainly of bangles and brooches.  There is a multi-coloured  striped bangle from this collection which is very difficult to find and it would cost you between £200 and £300.  She started producing many types of jewellery, as well as jewellery boxes, picture frames and other accessories, but she is best known for her brooches.  There was a high demand for these items and at one time the factory employed 50 people.  By the early 1980s they were facing competition from East Asia and the company closed, selling the remaining stock to a dealer in the US.  Stein’s designs were a huge success in the US and in 1988 she was persuaded to start designing again, although on a smaller scale.  A sleeping cat named ‘Gomina’ and ‘Ric the Dog’were among the first of her new designs.

If you are buying Lea Stein brooches you are getting a piece of design history.  While many designers used futuristic materials in psychedelic colours in the 1960s and 1970s Stein is a class above, in innovation and design.  Working with rhodoid took time and patience and some effects could take up to six months to perfect.  Also, because of the differences in finish, no two pieces are identical, which make them true collectors’ items.  The simplified lines of the brooches mean they are often mistaken for Art Deco.

The brooch that Lea Stein is best known for is the ‘Fox’ pin, which was first produced in 1968  You can get it in all types of colours and patterns, from pearlised snakeskin to glitter and the price is very reasonable at £30 – £35.  You could put together an entire collection of just foxes, as it comes in so many variations.

You should also look out for the ‘Joan Crawford’ or ‘Carmen’ pin.  It was made from 1968-80, and this is considered to be the ‘vintage’ Lea Stein period – you would have to pay between £65 and £70.  ’Tennis Woman’ and ‘The Diver’ are from the same period and would be a bit more expensive, as would her Rolls Royces, saxophones and Elvis Presleys.

In the 1970s Stein bought the licence to a French children’s TV show called L’ille aux Enfants and in 1975 she reproduced the characters as brooches.  These are now very difficult to come by, but if you do find one you would have to pay well over £100.  Even rarer are the geometric ‘Chinese Men’ pins, which would set you back in excess of £200.  Since 1988 Lea Stein has only designed one or two pieces a year and they are snapped up by collectors on both sides of the Atlantic.  These are great for collectors as they are produced in small quantities – look out for the ‘Ladybug’ pin from 1998 and the ‘Penguin’ pin from 2001.  For those of you who love Christmas, she did a limited edition of Christmas tree pins in 2001.

You can recognise a Lea Stein brooch by the distinctive elongated V shape pin at the back and most brooches are signed ‘Lea Stein Paris’.  While prices can be high for the rarer designs, many of the brooches can be found for between £25 – £70, which is fantastic value, given the design and craftsmanship and really good news if you are collecting Lea Stein brooches.

In 1822 Mordan got together with the inventor Samuel Hawkins and they developed a mechanism for a propelling pencil that became known as the ‘ever-pointed’ pencil.  Mordan then bought out Hawkins’ share of the rights and sold them to stationer Gabriel Riddle in order to finance the production of the pencils.  By 1836 he was not only making propelling pencils but also vesta cases, perfume bottles and other items, always in silver or gold and excellent in form as well as function, but the ‘ever-pointed’ pencil always remained at the core of the product range.  Mordan died in 1843 and the company was run by two of his sons with great success.  They were at their peak in the late 1800s, but by the beginning of the 20th century people became interested in the coloured plastic fountain pens that were now available.

Tragedy struck during WW2 when the factory was bombed and the company’s archives were destroyed along with the factory.  It is therefore very difficult to know the full production range, the only catalogue to survive is from 1898.  Most of the propelling pencils that were produced during the 19th century are simple, elegant silver cylinders, decorated with fluted or reeded columns.  They have ring sliders to extend the pencil mechanism and they can fetch between £30 and £300, depending on period of manufacture and condition of the item.  Many of these pencils are not hallmarked and sellers often do not realise that they are silver, therefore bargains are to be had.

Mordan propelling pencils made in the 20th century are more affordable and you can often pick them up between £10 and £30.  Watch out for dents, splits and missing parts, as it is almost impossible to get them repaired.  The 19th century silver pencils are very desirable, especially the ones with hand-engraved scrolling vines, flowers or leaves.  Have a good look at the terminal at the opposite end of the lead holder, which unscrews to reveal lead storage cylinders.  Elaborately cast examples, which should echo the design of the slider ring are the most sought after and therefore the most expensive.  Nearly all have stones set into the end and are sometimes engraved with a seal or monogram.  You would have to pay between £100 and £350 for one of these.

Gold, ivory and tortoiseshell were also used.  These were primarily made in the second half of the 19th century and they would fetch between £70 and £150, depending on size and decoration.  The most desirable Mordan pencils are the enamelled ones – they are very rare and very desirable and a finely detailed enamelled gold faceted pencil would easily fetch above £1,500.

Mordan’s propelling pencils did not just excell in decoration, they were also extremely innovative, some contain small knives, while others have bodies that act as rulers.  There is a rare sheath pencil that has a case for a compass and thermometer.  You should also look out for the three colour-pencils where the slider ring is divided into enamelled sections, each containing a different colour lead. Among the most easy to find are his pen and pencil combinations – they have two sliders, one moving the lead holder out, the other a pen nib holder.  Prices for these are between £60 ad £150 for a simple, late 19th century example and between £300 and £600 for an early example fitted with a rare ‘Bramah-type’ swivelling nib holder.

The most popular and also most expensive among the Mordan range are the novelty-shaped pencils, which were the company’s speciality.  There were many different themes, including animals, sports, weapons and many others.  Prices are high and you would need to pay between £300 and £1,500.  Animals are highly sought after and include owls, pigs and fish.  Other rare examples include a pistol, a range of enamelled Egyptian sarcophagi, champagne bottles and a very rare sword.

If you want to become a collector it is quite easy to date Mordan propelling pencils and you should look out for the following marks:

• SM/GR Hallmarks – Mordan was in partnership with Gabriel Riddle from 1824-36.  These are very rare
• S Mordan & Co Makers and Patentees - Used from 1836 to c1845, following the split from Riddle
• S Mordan & Co Makers – 1845 to c1852, these are hard to find
• S Mordan & Co - the most common mark, used from c1852 into the 20th century
• The ‘Mordan Arrow’ – it was only recently discovered that the arrow mark identifies a 10ct gold piece made by Mordan.

Unfortunately, the company never recovered from the fire at the factory and they finally shut their doors in 1952.

Compacts appeal to our feminine side and remind us of a bygone age when life was somewhat more elegant than today.  Because compacts were used by everyone they are not rare to find and can often be had for around £20 and you should definitely check out your local car boot sale or antiques fair.

Needless to say, the rarer examples are somewhat more expensive but still very affordable and prices depend on the condition of the piece.  If you are starting out collecting compacts you should initially look out for two makers, Stratton and Kigu, which are the best known British compact makers.  Stratton began making compacts in the 1920s and they were made in a number of shapes which were named Princess, Empress, Queen and so on.  If a compact was called a convertable it meant that it could hold pressed as well as loose powder.  The surface decorations were varied – there were gold tones, transfer prints and enamels as well as, tortoise shell, celluloid and embroidery.  Stratton did not only pay attention to the look of the compact, they were also interested in improving the functionality and one of it’s innovations was the self opening lid which saved many a smart lady from a broken fingernail.

As fashion changed and women no longer used face powder Stratton went into decline and was finally acquired in 2000 by Firmin & Sons and they still make a limited range of beautiful compacts.

Kigu of London took its name from the founder Gustav Kiaschek and Kigu compacts were very popular from the 1950s to the 1970s and there were some fascinating designs, especially the Flying Saucer.  This was first made in the mid to late 1950s when anything to do with space was very fashionable and the Flying Saucer compact was a piece of design genius.  Examples are very rare and go for hundreds of pounds when they come up at auction.  There are cheaper Kigu compacts and you should look out for one of their musical ones.

While Stratton and Kigu are among the best know of compact makers there are many others, including Mascot, Coty, Yardley, Vogue Vanities, as well Houbigant, a French make.  You will also find many unmarked compacts which can be especially beautiful and interesting.

If you want to start collecting compacts your first port of call should be an antiques and collector’s fair where you will usually find a good selection.  If you are within striking distance of Birmingham you should try to visit the Antiques for Everyone event, where you will find several sellers.  Car boot sales and flea markets are often a good source for compacts and you could end up with a bargain.

Before buying a compact you should check that it opens and closes easily and that the interior is not damaged.  When buying enamelled compacts check for damage, as enamel chips easily.  Be prepared to pay a premium if the compact is in its original pouch or box as this will add value.

The Art Nouveau movement had a dramatic effect on the design of drinking vessels.  If you would have had a glass of Hock in 1895 it would have been served in a glass that was not much different from what would have been used in ancient Rome.  They were usually made from green or brown glass with a hollow, ribbed stem splayed at the bottom to form a foot.  They were often enamelled or cut with town scenes or plants and birds.  The shape was functional rather than aesthetic.  Ten years later a glass of Hock would have been served in a totally transformed glass, which would have been constructed with a proper foot, a long, graceful stem and a stylish bowl which might have been enamelled with elegant flowers and hand cut to heighten its sleek appearance.

These stemmed glasses were much harder to make – the stem, foot and bowl had to be made as separate pieces, using different techniques.  They then had to be attached together while all three pieces were the same temperature, to avoid them cracking on contact.  The decorative cutting, usually at the base of the bowl, was very tricky to do successfully and these very delicate glasses had to be fired many times so that the fine polychrome enamel colours of the Art Nouveau images could be applied.

Art Noveau had arrived and wine glasses had become exotic objects in their own right.  Glassmakers soon realised that for a wine glass to feel good in the hand, it was necessary for the weight to be at the top and bottom, which was the total opposite of the ‘roman’ glass, where the weight was in the stem and this made it feel clunky.  Nowadays, people’s taste is for clear glass and also, as glasses are mass produced, the excesses of the Art Noveau style have been lost.  However, they make great collectors’ pieces and here are some of the names you should be looking out for if you want to collect.

Theresienthal - these glassworks were opened in 1836 by the Steigerwald brothers and they changed hands many times.  By the 1890s the Poschinger family had taken over and established a major market selling roman style hock glasses.  Because they were already making large quantities of stemware, they were able to produce the widest, most successful range of Art Nouveau drinking glasses, as well as decanters, bowls and plates.  They are very collectable and one of the better examples would probably cost you from £200 upwards, but there are cheaper ones to be had.

Fritz Heckert - was a very successful German glassmaker and he quickly adapted to the Art Nouveau style.  You might say that the company had compromised by retaining the flared stem for most of the glasses, but they managed to introduce a much more elegant Nouveau style.  You should be able to get a nice glass from about £50 upwards.

Moser - first established in 1857, this was probably the biggest of the glasshouses to attempt Nouveau stems.  Their style was unique as it focused on cut glasses and shunned the enamel styles.  Moser is still a major force in the Czech glass industry today.

Meyr’s Neffe and Josephinenhutte - these are a little behind the big three and their output is only partly documented and if you see any glasses marked up ‘origin unknown’ they could well be by one of them.  Like Theresienthal, Meyr’s Neffe did tableware as well as glasses and although collectors don’t tend to go for these, there are some very nice pieces.

There were probably some 20 or 30 glasshouses throughout Bavaria and Bohemia, all making lovely Art Nouveau stems in the early 20th century.  If you are interested in collecting try an antiques fair where there will be specialist sellers who will be very happy to give advice.  If your budget is on the small side there are many examples of lovely Art Nouveau stemmed glasses by unknown makers and these can be picked up at very reasonable prices.