ReviewBook Shorts
The story of an Irish family’s history and its porcelain service are woven together in this fascinating book
The recovery of a Worcester soft-paste collection sheds light on 18th-century Anglo-Irish culture
ReviewBook Shorts
A catalogue demonstrates Boucher’s mastery of the 'Chinese' taste
The essays in this book investigate the many facets of this extraordinary 18th-century fashion
ReviewBook Shorts
This small book tackles for the first time a very large subject: how relics were displayed in the Middle Ages
The way in which relics were presented determined what and how people thought of them, according to this publication of lectures
NewsMuseums & Heritage
Brighton Pavilion gets its glitter back as fanciful treasures return on long-term loan from the Queen
More of the startling objects collected by George IV will return from Buckingham Palace in early 2020
NewsMuseums
Staff quit in droves at Russian museum as ‘starvation wages’ bite
Deputy director’s swingeing salary cuts trigger resignations of around 50 employees at Moscow theatre museum
ReviewBook Shorts
Catalogue of Colmar Treasure conjures up picture of 14th-century bourgeois Jewish life in France
Hoard of objects loaned by Paris's Musée de Cluny to the Metropolitan Museum of Art tells a complex tale
ReviewBooks
New catalogue presents virtuosity of Neo-Classicist goldsmith Luigi Valadier
Alvar González-Palacios’s book on the Italian decorator is a peak in his distinguished career
ArchiveArt market
Elaborate, traditional pieces sold well at the latest auctions
Chinese and Russian buyers with a taste for the ornate have added a new layer of bidding and are forcing prices ever higher
ArchiveArt market
Decorative arts market report: The field is booming, fuelled by museum buying and style-hounds
"Sold to the person in the Prada suit"
ArchiveArt market
Decorative arts sales shift to Chicago
New York vies with London for nineteenth- and twentieth-century decorative arts sales, but Chicago is coming on quickly
ArchiveArt market
Post-1935 decorative arts, mass produced at exclusive prices
A survey of the decorative arts market
ArchiveArt market
A rising market: contemporary decorative arts
Is it design, or art, or craft? Who cares. One thing is certain: the British are best at it
ArchiveMuseums & Heritage
Decorative arts from Art Nouveau and Deco to Werkbund, Bauhaus and Functionalism
Another floor opens up in the Bröhan Museum with its privately formed collection
ArchiveMuseums & Heritage
A missing chapter in the history of the decorative arts: the Restoration and July Monarchy
Louvre-organised show at the Grand Palais of neglected period of production
ReviewExhibitions
‘Less is a Bore’: ICA Boston takes Maximalism to the max
Exhibition celebrates patterns yet transcends decoration
ArchiveMetropolitan Museum of Art
Star exhibit at the Met: the Christopher Dresser album the V&A could not afford
Modern designs at the Met
NewsChâteau de Versailles
Château de Versailles buys back €4m royal commode that left France after Louvre missed its royal mark
The piece of furniture by Bernard II van Risenburgh, which left for the US almost four decades ago, was commissioned by Louis XV for his stepdaughter
InterviewJewellery
Wakanda comes to Washington
Douriean Fletcher, who made the jewellery for Black Panther, speaks at the National Museum of Women in the Arts
ArchiveArt market
French decorative arts apparently recession-proof
The international market absorbs the Polo, Patiño and Johnson collections in one year. Tous les Louis do well but Louis XVI best of all
ReviewBook Shorts
The art-historical treasures of Clementia of Hungary, Queen of France
Book looks at one royal's Medieval gifts, giving and inventories
FeatureObituaries
Remembering Jayne Wrightsman
A reminiscence of the New York socialite, arts patron and philanthropist by Keith Christiansen, the chairman of the Met's European Paintings Department
ReviewBook Shorts
Kings, queens but mostly lesser royal hangers-on: the art-historical story of Kensington Palace
The great building as seen through the generations of its occupants
ReviewBook Shorts
A book on birth and child-rearing before Dr Spock
The history—in images and works of decorative art—of giving birth and raising children before 1900
ReviewBooks
A hefty tome on the arts of the Austro-Hungarian belle époque
The extraordinary mitteleuropäische flourishing of all the arts from 1900 to 1914
NewsConservation & Preservation
Restored, but demoted: stained-glass window not by Tiffany, expert says
River of Life depiction has been newly reattributed to J & R Lamb Studios
NewsOpenings
A bigger splash: France's expanded La Piscine museum reopens after makeover
Former Art Deco swimming pool in Roubaix dives into Modern French sculpture
NewsExhibitions
How Nazi-commissioned tapestries ended up in the Louvre’s collection
An exhibition of 100 masterpieces from the Gobelins manufactory reveals a complicated repatriation after the Second World War
NewsConservation & Preservation
The amazing technicolour Chippendale: museum injects colour back into 18th-century work
Show at Leeds City Museum is one of this year's many events commemorating the tercentenary of the furniture maker’s birth
BlogIn the frame
Ben Carson’s bad taste lands him before Congress
NewsArt fairs
See the ‘holy grail’ of American porcelain at New York Ceramics & Glass Fair
The 18th-century punch bowl was unearthed during an archaeological dig in Philadelphia
NewsAuctions
Bonhams Los Angeles offers rare Quahog pearl that escaped the dinner table
New England grad student found the gem in a bag of clams he bought for $25
NewsHeritage
A timewarp in every room: French château Azay-le-Rideau restored
A major overhaul of the house’s interiors will recreate different a historical period on each floor
NewsArtists
Watts couple’s revamped ‘his and hers’ studios to open in Compton
Visitors can watch conservators at work in the renovated space
NewsAuctions
The jewel with a sparkling history
Secret legacies, family feuds and the aristocratic rakes who couldn’t resist a bet
NewsCommercial galleries
European dealers bring eclectic mix of antiques and Old Masters to New York
In their first collaboration, the gallerists are showing 300 works priced from $30,000 to $10m
NewsAuctions
Surfacing on the market: Armchair fit for a queen
Christie’s, London, Taste of the Royal Court: Important French Furniture and Works of Art from a Private Collection, 9 July
NewsArt
Divine drawers and pietre dure dazzle in Wiltshire
Dora Thornton on the amazing cabinet of Pope Sixtus V
NewsArt
Gothic and Baroque—the two Golden Ages of ivory carving
David Ekserdjian finds these new books timely and uplifting
NewsAuctions
Surfacing on the market: Soviet propaganda served up on a plate
Lempertz, Berlin, Berlin Sale, 2 May
NewsArt market
Family connection adds value to Vautrin’s designs
NewsDecorative arts
May is craft time in London
More than 50 venues around the city are organising events and exhibitions that focus on decorative arts and artisans
ArchiveCollectors
Scholar-collector John Hardy’s historic pieces for sale at Christie’s
A selection of objects with exceptional histories
ArchiveVictoria & Albert Museum
A short history of furniture from the V&A
Simon Swynfen Jervis selects his highlights from the V&A, spanning five centuries
ArchiveMuseums & Heritage
France: Decorative arts president resigns
Cites personal reasons
ArchiveWilliam Morris
Books: William Morris and creating a social fabric
An indispensable book on Morris’s revolutionary cloth designs and techniques—and the political views that inspired them
ArchiveCollectors
Connoisseur collectors: A story of ten approaches to acquiring art
From Liechtenstein to Lisbon, these collectors discuss their interests and methods
ArchiveArt fairs
New galleries and keen collectors at Design Miami
The modern and contemporary design fair's profile is rising
ArchiveBooks
Maiolica explained through the world’s greatest collection of Renaissance decorative art
This book, linked to a current exhibition, explores the V&A’s unrivalled holdings
ArchiveArt market
What Chinese collectors are really buying
While ancient art and ceramics remain popular, Contemporary Chinese art is taking off at home, and buyers outside the mainland are slowly looking toward Western art
ArchiveArt market
Collectors remain cautious at Pavilion of Arts and Design in Paris as impulse buying declines
Many dealers reported mixed results from the fair
ArchiveRestitution
Met faces claims for Hittite artefacts
Provenance of late trustee’s gifts investigated as Turkey takes tougher line on restitution
ArchiveBooks
Impressive publication on the anonymous 'RA' collection of Chinese porcelain
Maria Antónia Pinto de Matos' three-volume catalogue is painstakingly researched and beautifully presented
ArchiveDecorative arts
BBC and V&A collaborate on decorative arts programme
“Handmade in Britain”
ArchiveAsian art
Maynards looks East as Canadian auction house targets new Asian collectors
Striking while the market is hot
ArchiveArt market
A selection of the most sought after works of Asian art recently sold
The objects that made collectors dig deep
ArchiveExhibitions
The many faces of medieval women on view in Bilbao
Elegant, humorous, erotic—and liberated
ArchiveDecorative arts
Invitation to a hanging
The story and study of the remarkable Toms Collection of tapestries
ArchiveMuseums & Heritage
Bringing back the Baroque—colonial style
Yale prepares for the 2012 installation of its decorative arts galleries by reconstructing a period room
ArchiveDecorative arts
The catalogue of the Ashmolean’s English and continental gold and silver
Oxford’s greatest treasure trove
ArchiveVictoria & Albert Museum
V&A ceramics galleries to open in full, while European collection waits its turn for refurbishment
Completion is expected in 2014 or 2015
ArchiveVictoria & Albert Museum
Books: The continuities in Medieval and Renaissance art at the V&A
A deep look into the remarkable objects now on display in the museum's recently opened galleries
ArchiveVictoria & Albert Museum
V&A plans £120m second phase of renewals
Medieval and Renaissance galleries crown phase one of museum’s “Future Plan”
ArchiveVictoria & Albert Museum
Openings and expansions: Ceramics at the V&A
Over 3000 objects from 2500CB to the present day on display
ArchiveExhibitions
The luxuries of a vanished world of Maharajas are explored through over 250 objects at the V&A
Next month the V&A in London presents 'Maharaja: the Splendour of India’s Royal Courts'
ArchivePre-Raphaelites
Books: William Morris and Edward Burne-Jones presented in an unfamiliar light
Collaboration and contradiction in the Pre-Raphaelite world
ArchiveRestitution
For sale: works seized by Stasi
The East German intelligence service confiscated hundreds of items in the 1970s and 1980s, which are now being returned to their rightful owners and their heirs
ArchiveBooks
Book review: the history of Irish furniture in all its finery
An invaluable resource, lavishly illustrated
ArchiveJapanese art
Illuminating lacquer maker Onishi Isao, one of Japan's Living National Treasures
“The beauty is in the process and the final object is the sum of the path"
ArchiveMuseums & Heritage
Metropolitan re-opens Wrightsman Galleries for French Decorative Arts
Also now open is its Ruth and Harold D. Uris Center for Education
ArchiveArt fairs
Asia Week, New York: Dealers and auction houses report strong sales
There were new buyers and more collectors from India and China, but the art fairs were quieter events
ArchiveCommercial galleries
Former fugitive opens decorative arts gallery
Roberto Polo, once the toast of Paris, returns in style
ArchiveMuseums & Heritage
Museum of Decorative Arts to re-open in Paris—six years late
September launch will complete “Grand Louvre” project
ArchiveArt market
Modern Indian art fetches top prices at Sotheby's
But older decorative arts of the subcontinent fail to excite buyers
ArchiveArt market
Parisian auction results buoyed by decorative arts
Most auctioneers reported increased sales in 2005
ArchiveArt Basel in Miami Beach
The new domesticity in Contemporary art
Focus is on the decorative arts at Art Basel Miami Beach