"The biggest and most important sale of posters that has ever been held..."

Dr. Richard Furness, railway historian and author

The Malcolm Guest Railway Collection

The first part of the collection came under the hammer in a two-day sale on Friday 15th and Saturday 16th January.   The sale included 580 lots of vintage railway posters followed by original artwork for posters and printed matter, railway collectors items, GWR and other regional archives, books and ephemera.

A leading expert in vintage posters has said that he believed the sale to be the largest and most important collection of posters to have ever come on the market. 

Part I of the collection created a huge amount of interest with coverage by the television, radio and newspapers.  Collectors travelled from all parts of the UK in atrocioius weather conditions to view and attend the sale.

A bank of seven telephone bidding clerks fielded in excess of 500 telephone bids over the two days, with one buyer in New York bidding on 170 lots over a duration of eight and a half hours.  An unprecedented number of commission bids were logged and the live bidding on the internet was virtually constant throughout the sale with over 100 active bidders at any one time.

The sale realised £410,000

Part II of the collection was offered in the Spring Fine Art and Antique Catalogue sale held on 4th March and will included a work by David Shepherd, oil on canvas, 61 x 91 illustrated here sold for £23,000

A parcel wrapped in brown paper and string, stored amongst the railway items, when opened revealed the most amazing find - the original artwork by William Heath Robinson for GWR's centenary publication Railway Ribaldry 1935, comprising eighty three pen and ink drawings. 

These iconic works in 83 lots sold for a total of £145,000

The remaining posters, approximately two thousand, mainly dating from the 1960s and 1970s, will come up for auction later in the year.

For the story behind the collection please click here

Live Bidding for catalogue sales

Morphets introduced live bidding on the internet to their quarterly catalogue sales in 2007 and have seen bidding on the internet grow sale on sale.  The first UK live video link was trialled successfully at Morphets’ March catalogue auction allowing bidders world wide to both hear and see the auctioneer in real time and to bid from their computers.  This proved to be particularly popular when a private collection of Chinese ceramics and works of art came under the hammer on behalf of a local deceased estate.  Virtually every lot saw bidding on the internet, with many of the top bids from mainland China, from Europe.

To register for Live Bidding please visit www.the-saleroom.com.  Please note that any bids made through the-saleroom will attract an additional 3% plus VAT Buyers Premium.