The School for Scandal Signs

A stolen gem!!!! beautiful penned circa mid to late 18th century notice for it to be returned. Housed in a later glazed deep moulded gilt frame “Stolen or strayed the 8th instant At...

A collection of four oak classroom door plaques, hand painted with gilt lettering, chamfered decorative edges and counter sunk fixing holes. More than likely from a well to do teach...

A charming collection of six, hand painted Horse stable name plaques. Each plaque is pine, with an ebonised painted ground and gilt lettering. Age related knocks and abrasions comm...

A fun collection of Italian butchers display meats that would off adored a traditional delicatessen. Within the collection there is a pair of late 19th/early 20th century plaster an...

An impressive rare and monumental in scale folk art pawnbroker trade sign with its original trio of giltwood spheres which represent the universal symbol for the pawnbroker trade. ...

A 19th century hand blown glass chemist window display carboy. Used as a symbol of the pharmacy from the 17th century to the early 20th century. A rare example with a hollow cut ...

Hanging double sided trade sign, sheet metal with a black ground and gilt lettering. Two pretty cast iron riveted hanging brackets. A small Star of Solomon is located in the corner ...

A large carved and polychrome painted tobacconist's figure almost certainly 17th or early 18th century For a related example see Edward H. Pinto, Treen and other Wooden Bygones, Bell and Hyman, London 1969. Page 412, plate 436. Originally this may well have been a tobacconist's shop window figure. For a similar, but slightly earlier unpainted example, see Sotheby's, The W. J. Shepherd collection of treen, 30th November 1983, Lot 393, illustrated in Pinto "Wooden Bygones of Smoking and Snuff Taking", plate 1. Carved wooden figures, often painted, were placed outside tobacconist's shops as signs from the 17th century onwards. The earliest of these figures is the 'black boy' or 'blackamoor'. 'At the sign of the black boy' or 'at the sign of the blackamoor' was a popular address for tobacconists since the early 17th century. The 17th century figures...

A very early 19th century chemist display carboy, circa 1820 possibly earlier The bulbous center sits on a stepped base with a swan like neck and a fine cut glass oversized stopp...