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Your support makes all the difference.Throw away your rubber wet suit - the latest fetish wear is heavy metal. This hand-beaten copper diving helmet is being offered by Christie's South Kensington in their maritime sale on Thursday (10.30am) at an estimated pounds 5,000-pounds 7,000. Groove the night away in your own private world. For an extra pounds 1,000-pounds 1,500 you might get the Victorian air pump that goes with it, as a reviver in the small hours. Just go easy on the hand beating.
The voluptuous but misshapen Victorian nude in a landscape is by a "follower of William Etty". As any connoisseur will tell you, Etty could not paint for toffee. But he was obsessed with female nudity and attended life classes almost daily until his death. He was accused of indecency. Now, we are told, he had followers. What a scene. Estimate pounds 400-pounds 600 in South Ken's sale of British and Victorian pictures, Thursday (10.30am).
More eccentric headgear - Tommy Cooper's red fez and Wilfrid Bramble's trilby from the Steptoe and Son television series. The fez is estimated pounds 150-pounds 200 and the trilby pounds 60-pounds 80 at Bonhams Chelsea's film and entertainment sale on Thursday (11am). There are probably more Cooper fezes than Bramble trilbies kicking around, but fans could push up the price of both.
For an estimated pounds 200-pounds 250 you could pick up a lot of six different spoons dating from the 14th to the early 16th centuries at Christie's South Kensington's spoons and flatware sale, next Tuesday (1pm). They make ideal gifts. The one shown here is made from latten, a brass-like alloy, and has a twisted knop at the end of the handle to stop it falling out of belts or hat-bands. In those days people carried their own eating tools.
Two provincial pussy cats: Beatrice Potter's ceramic Simpkin, in Beswick ware, is expected to fetch more than pounds 400 in Penrith Farmers & Kidds' general sale in Penrith, Cumbria, tomorrow (9am) and the fluffy Steiff kitten, hardly 4in tall, is estimated pounds 25-pounds 35 at Hobbs & Chambers general sale in Cirencester on Thursday (9.30am). She is labelled Susi by the makers. You didn't know that Steiff made cats as well as teddies? Well, they did.
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