The team of BBC ONE’s ever popular Sunday evening programme ANTIQUES ROADSHOW is delighted to be visiting Stowe House, near Buckingham, on Thursday 19 July 2012. Visitors are invited to come along with their family heirlooms and car boot bargains. The doors are open from 9.30 am to 4.30 pm and entry is free.
This will be presenter Fiona Bruce’s fifth year with the Roadshow and she says, “Presenting the Antiques Roadshow is, for me, one of those rare and very lucky coincidences in television when you get to work on a show that you already love to watch. Exploring the human story behind every object is what makes the Antiques Roadshow so fascinating. And everyone loves the agony and ecstasy of the ‘what’s it worth?’ moment. The AR isn’t just about antiques – it’s history, beauty and drama all wrapped up in one.’
Some of Britain’s leading antiques and fine arts specialists will be on hand to offer free advice and valuations to visitors, who are invited to raid their attics and bring along their ‘treasures’ for inspection by the experts. People with large pieces of furniture or other big items can send details and photographs of their objects to: ANTIQUES ROADSHOW, BBC, Whiteladies Road, Bristol BS8 2LR or e-mail them to: antiques.roadshow@bbc.co.uk.
It may be possible to arrange to look at the item in advance and organise transportation to the venue.
Series Editor Simon Shaw says: “The team is looking forward to visiting Stowe House. It’s always exciting to see what will come to light on the day. We regularly see between 1,500 and 2,000 visitors on the day. Despite the high turnout everyone will get to see an expert.”
More information can be found at: www.bbc.co.uk/antiquesroadshow
The Stowe House Preservation Trust (SHPT) recently launched an appeal for the public’s assistance in finding out what happened to the lost treasures of Stowe. Over 150 years ago Stowe House, the magnificent Grade I listed Neoclassical palace set in 400 acres of landscaped park in Buckinghamshire, was stripped of its contents in a series of auctions starting with the first Great Sale of Stowe, which lasted 37 days in 1848 when most of the paintings and works of art and much of the state furniture came under the gavel. By 1923 the house had been stripped of every fixture and fitting and faced the threat of demolition but escaped the bulldozers thanks to the foundation of Stowe School in 1923.
While many important items from Stowe found their way into national and international museums and institutions, most have disappeared into private collections. These are the pieces that the SHPT would like to track down, not to buy them back but to photograph them and thereby create a ‘virtual’ collection to give future visitors to Stowe an idea of the rooms in their original glory. The SHPT is also eager to discover images, sketches, photographs or prints of the interiors of the house and its contents before 1922. Such images, together with digitised auction catalogues, would form part of the online forum to identify lost treasures.
Who knows, perhaps a lost treasure or two might turn up on 19 July?
To find out how you can join in the search, or to register items, visit www.stowetreasures.org or e-mail losttreasures@stowe.co.uk.
How to get to Stowe House:
Detailed directions can be downloaded from the website www.stowehouse.org. Entry to Stowe House is via the National Trust’s new visitor entrance, New Inn, on the south side of the estate.
By road: M40 from west London: leave at J10 take A43, then A422 to Buckingham, then follow NT Stowe Landscape Gardens sign; from Birmingham leave at J11 follow A422 as above.
M1 from London leave at J13, take A421 towards Buckingham, A422 to Brackley; from the north leave at J15a.
By rail: nearest stations are Milton Keynes (16 miles) and Bicester North (11 miles)
By bus: nearest buses are to Buckingham (3 miles)
