Featured Nagina carving, a lost art

The picture shows the right image and for less than £7 it's no biggy if it's a mistake. I'm looking forward to getting it. Again thank you for the heads up

 

I was going to ask, for a long time I was finding it difficult to find any Anglo-Indian pieces and just thought with Google lens it was a end of a bargain hunting era. Recently I have bought a number of pieces, these 2 in the last week, (not fantastic) but still the prices I paid and their descriptions haven't looked like they were researched at all. I found the brass hoshiarpur box being described as "teak brass inlaid box" and post 1940 and the Sadeli as vintage. hoshiarpur £13 and the Sadei £25 including P&P
Are you having the same luck or have you found it far harder since Google lens?

 

if folks are going to give away stuff they know nothing about.........the least you can do is oblige them !!!!!
Nice finds !!!!!!!!!!

 

Very nice pieces. I’ve actually started buying pieces which need some work so that I can practise repairing them. I’m away at the moment but will post a picture of my latest effort when I am back.

 

I have restored nearly all my antiques, I've just bought a special item that may allow me to lift Sadeli off doner pieces keeping them intact, allow me to see where I'm cutting and put them on the box I'm restoring without the micro mosaics moving. I don't know if it will work yet but if it does no missing sadeli, the major obstacle in collecting BTW did you see how good the sadeli is on the box I just bought
I look forward to seeing what you've done, glad to help if needed.

 

The sadeli work is very intricate and detailed but the carved is also rather beautiful. I’m afraid my examples are nowhere near this exquisite and are rather more basic but you have to start somewhere.

 

You do need to start somewhere, if I bought tip top antiques I'd be broke, half of the fun for me is finding a sleeper that needs work, most dealers take into account the cost of restoration but they can never be sure of the full cost. Learn how to restore and see your collection shine

 

It would be just rude for me not to oblige, I'm very polite when it comes to antiques

 

Oh BTW the book came today, I had feared I would know it all but to my surprise I didn't know hardly anything, it's all before 1720's, I do hope I find something I saw in the book

 

,,,,,,,,,, my books... know way more that I do !!!!!!!

 

Glad I suggested a book with something interesting . Was worried it might be a little too familiar for you. A pre 1720s sleeper. Now wouldn’t that be nice.

 

Ok so I bought this today. It’s a complete gamble as I know nothing about brass inlay boxes but the inlay looked unusually fine. Obviously I haven’t had time to clean it as I’m on holiday but Raver, is this a sleeper or rubbish. Either way I only paid £10 for it and it’s about 3 inches square. Sorry the photo is not great.

 

Slightly better one.

 

For a tenner go can't go wrong, personally I've shied away from brass inlaid boxes because they are easy to fake, hoshiarpur brass boxes have a certain pattern but they don't have anywhere near as much value as ivory inlay but for the £13 I paid it's worth more than that. I don't about the brass inlaid box you have, it seems well made, sometimes I go by the hinges to date boxes if I can't find anything else, it's clearly Indian and looks old but other than that I just don't know.

 

Thanks Raver. Same here, it’s not normally my thing either but I saw it hiding at the back under some other boxes so I took a punt. I wonder if this is a Tarkashi box rather than hoshiarpur box as it’s mostly wire and no brass foliage style.

 

I don't think yours is a hoshiarpur box, from what I can see Tarkashi box looks right as for age I don't know. So many brass wire and nail boxes were produced all with different designs, the only reason I bought the brass hoshiarpur box above was it so cheap, I can't remember the last time I saw a ivory one on ebay, in the early days I bought 3 large ones in one year all for less than £100 each, today even the small ones are £300+ and all the big ones are sold, I can't find a big one for sale anywhere. BTW did you see I bought a satinwood desk for £5.45 on ebay lol I picked it up today (I posted it in furniture on here if you want to see) I spent today making a key and freeing up the 9 locks, they all work now, I will start the full restoration tomorrow.

 

It is getting more difficult, particularly on eBay but I think you can still find some bargains in antique shops as most are not particularly knowledgeable about Asian antiques, especially Indian and Sri Lankan. No I haven’t seen the satinwood desk. I’ll take a look .

 

I picked up a solid silver Chinese bracelert that way, years ago. It was made for the Chinese market and only marked "silver" in Chinese. Someone sold it as costume.