All language subtitles for Antiques Uncovered S01E01 HDTV

Apart from being beautiful,
exquisitely made

and often hugely valuable.

Look at the workmanship on this.
This is really Georgian bling.

'But why were they made
in the first place?

'And who were they made for?'

Candles were so expensive,
it would have felt like

actually burning money
to light them.

'Whether from a stately home
or a two-up two-down,

'antiques unlock
a fascinating history

'of the way we lived then and now.'

They're very amusing slides,
but would have been terrifying if
you'd never seen a moving picture.

'I'm historian Doctor Lucy Worsley.

'I'll uncover the stories behind
some of these remarkable objects.'

'I'm antiques expert Mark Hill.

'I'll be looking at why some items
have become priceless,

'while others
are the collectables of tomorrow.'

You don't need to be an aristocrat
to own this.

People may pay sort of £30-£40
for a teacup and saucer.

'We'll meet the historians
and curators who preserve them.'

'The highly-skilled craftspeople
who still make them.'

The Chinese and the Japanese
would sour their clay

for up to 200 years.

'And the passionate people
who collect them.'

Oh, my goodness gracious me!

The earliest one is 113 years old
and it's still working.

We're going to put antiques in
their historical and social context.

Today, we'll examine antiques
from the world of entertaining.

We discover who made them,
what they cost,
how they changed our behaviour

and follow their journey

through history into our homes.

'We've come to Woburn Abbey
in Bedfordshire,

'the ancestral home
of the Duke of Bedford.

'Over the centuries, it's been
at the forefront of entertaining,

'so it's a really good place
to start.'

This grand house is typical
of the country houses

built during the golden age
of the 18th century.

You're right.
This is a real whopper.

But it's not just for one old duke
sitting in there all by himself,

it's also for his family
and his servants and his friends.

It's really built for entertaining.

Right at the heart of this,
you'd have found the rooms
used for entertainment

and the dining room, where he'd have
been able to display his wealth
and social status.

Now, what we're interested in
is his kit, his paraphernalia.

He's got top-of-the-range,
lavish stuff in there.

Over the next couple of centuries,

we're going to see that trickling
down into everybody's houses.

'Our day starts with something
very British indeed, a cup of tea.

'In the 17th century,
green tea started being shipped
from China to Europe,

'along with porcelain teacups.

'Exotic and delicate,
this porcelain was so desirable

'that it became known
as white gold.'

You requested tea, my dear.
Thanks, Carson.

I've been called many things,
but not that.

What have we got here, then?

We have porcelain tea bowls.

We're going to have a drink
they've been having
since the late 17th century.

Absolutely. 1660s, this caught on.

What actually came over with the tea
from the East was porcelain.

This was originally not the key
part of the whole transaction,

this was just
the ballast for the ship.

In many instances, absolutely.

The Chinese developed porcelain
in the 10th century.

And, of course, exported it.
China-mania gripped Britain
by the 18th century.

And there was a race on, effectively,
who could produce this white gold.

This very valuable,
very sought-after material.

It was translucent,
but it held hot water.

People beforehand used pottery
and stoneware that was opaque,
you couldn't see through it.

It was heavy, it was brown.

And it was also the fact that
it was complicated paraphernalia.
I think we all rather like gadgets.

So as this new drink
becomes introduced,

people tend to go for the
accoutrements that go with it.

This has got a really wonderful,
timeless, Oriental quality to it.

This particular design
shows koi carp

swimming around forever
in a blue and white world.

But what you've got there
isn't Chinese at all. No, it's not.

This is a tea bowl and saucer
produced by the Worcester factory.

And this is about 1770, 1780.

And it's the mother and child
pattern.

The big difference
is many motifs in Chinese porcelain

are sort of iconographic.
They have a meaning.

And this was sort of our Western view

of what we might think
a Chinese scene might be.

And you can go out
and buy one of these?

You can. I think you'd probably
get change out of around £60 or £70.

But this one,
you'd probably get change,

if you had to go to a dealers,
out of £200.

It's a scarcer piece than that.

That's very much a mass-produced
piece of export ware.

You can see the sort
of democratisation of production.

You can also see
the democratisation of tea.

If you're the mistress of the
house, you keep your tea locked up
in a caddy.

You don't let anyone else touch it,
let alone your servants.

But as we go through
the 18th century,

servants expect a tea allowance
as part of their wages.

Everybody has become addicted
to tea.

It's described as a fatal liquor
that'll bring you to death's door.

Good lord! And I suppose it's fear
of its addictive properties.

Because we do know that once you've
had tea, you can't get enough of it.

'This cup was the culmination
of decades of endeavour.'

Ever since Chinese porcelain
arrived on these shores,

British potters had been trying
to crack its secret formula.

In 1752, Benjamin Lund finally
discovered the magic ingredient,

Cornish soapstone,
otherwise known as talcum powder.

Worcester bought his formula,

and by 1755, was making the best

blue and white English porcelain
money could buy.

So obsessed was the country
with all things Chinese,

that even our porcelain
was named after it.

China.

I'm at the Gladstone Pottery Museum
in Stoke-on-Trent

to meet master potter
and historian Kevin Millward.

So, this was the secret ingredient
that lead to Worcester's success.

And there was a great reason
for that, wasn't there?

This gave them a quality
that was desirable.

And that's thermal shock resistance.

And by thermal shock, you mean having
the teacup there, on a table,

nice tea party, ladies come around
to have a nice chat,

somebody picks up the hot teapot,

pours boiling water in...
And it would shatter. Yeah.

And obviously,
that's supposedly the origin

of the two types
of tea-drinking styles.

The poor people
have to put the milk in first

so that the cup doesn't shatter,

and the aristocracy, who can afford
the best-quality china,

they can pour their boiling tea
straight into the cup.

This was presumably quite secret.
Oh! Um...incredibly so.

Because you are talking about pieces

that were selling
for astronomical amounts of money.

Only the very wealthy
could afford this.

I think a simple teacup or tea dish

would have cost somewhere in the
region of £450 in today's money.

In 1794, that was about eight pounds.

Yep. So, can you show us exactly how
much of each would be included? Yep.

'To make the porcelain clay,

'Kevin mixes together
china clay, silica,

'which is basically sand,

'glass cullet or frit
and only 1% of soapstone.

'Surprisingly little,
given it was the key ingredient.'

We need the water at this stage
to get the materials

to mix together evenly.

And mix together as evenly as I can,
is what I will now do.

My goodness! Making porcelain.

The clay that we are mixing together
is called the body. Yep.

But as you can see, we've gone from
this sort of dry powder

into what looks a little bit like
custard at this stage.

It's got to be dried out
and the water taken out of it.
What happens next?

Well, what we're going to do here
is a very simple way

of reducing the water content,

and that is, we'll take some of
this, and put it on a plaster bat.

Mm-hm. And the plaster is porous.

Ah! So that absorbs the water.

It takes a few seconds.

But you can see the consistency
changing now. Oh, lord! Yes.

It's like thickening up gravy
or something. Yep. Yep.

You can virtually scrape it off now.
That's much more like clay.

You can see now we have
a little nugget of plastic clay.

Now, to a potter, this is dead.

Dead? How do you mean?

It's raw materials brought together,

but it has no body to it.

So what we need to do to this now

is put it away
for as long as possible,

which we call souring,

and that will induce
bacterial growth.

And if you've ever found
a sort of dish rag

that's been in water too long
and it's going a little bit black,

when you touch it, it's slimy.

Oh! Yeah? And that's exactly
what we want in this.

And, in fact, one of my students
quite a few years ago

was complaining about the lack
of plasticity in the porcelain body,

and I said, "Why don't you do
what the old makers would do?"

And he said, "What was that?"
I said, "Pee on the clay."

Oh, goodness gracious!
So that's what he did.

Now, it's said that the Chinese
and the Japanese

would sour their clay
for up to 200 years.

So, clay that was prepared

would only be used by great-great
grandchildren. Good lord!

Right. We've got the clay
matured, soured, prepared.

Ready to go.
Ready to go on the wheel.

I think my job here is clear.

I'm going to provide the power.
You're going to provide the power.

Which way do I turn? That's right,
towards me. Towards me. OK.

Right. Just slow down a touch.

OK.

Who would have done this?
I'm quite tall, but it's quite,

I should imagine, backbreaking,
after a day. Women and children.

Women and children? Yeah.

Presumably not very well paid.

Not very well paid at all.

So, were you under pressure,
the potter?

Yes. You'd be working piecework,

so you were paid
by the quantity that you produced.

So, how many would you have
to produce in a day?

I would say somebody throwing
a cup similar to this

could be expected to throw

anywhere between 750 and 1,000
of these a day.

A day? Yeah.

'Creating decorative chinaware

'had always been a painstaking
process done by hand.

'But the invention of transfer
printing in the 1750s

'revolutionised the process,

'enabling mass production
of images on ceramics.

'An engraved image on a copper plate
is filled with ink,

'which is transferred onto tissue
paper by passing it through rollers.

'The design is then placed
onto the ceramic.

'Sometimes, as a final embellishment,

'hand-enamelling over the design
would add colour and detail.

'This, coupled with Josiah Spode's
creation

'of fine bone china in about 1800,

'took tea sets
out of the realm of the few

'and brought them to the many.'

And these are very pretty
little cups, aren't they?

They are.
They date from around 1900.

They're by a well-known manufacturer
called Spode.

And Spode, of course,
developed bone china.

Bone china was to prove
quite revolutionary

because it allowed all sorts
of different social classes

to own a fine china
or a porcelain tea set.

So this is porcelain-for-the-people
bone china. It's exactly that.

Now, tea, the meal,
was invented by a duchess.

And I guess afternoon tea

still has quite classy, aristocratic
connections, doesn't it?

If you're going out to tea,
you'll have something quite fancy
and will eat again later.

But, if you're a working-class
person

and you say, "I'm going home for my
tea," you don't mean that, do you?

You mean your main evening meal.
Absolutely.

It's around 4 o'clock. The sun
is going down. Let's get on with it.

Tea wasn't the only exotic import
from foreign parts

that firmly established itself
in our culture.

The sofa gets its name from suffah,

an Arabic word that means
long, stuffed seat for reclining.

And it became popular, too.

Today, we usually find it
in the living room,

but it started life as a piece
of furniture in the bedroom.

This is a very lovely bedroom.
Come and look at this.

Fit for a queen, I'd say.

But what we've really come to see
is this piece of furniture,

which is...well,
it's kind of flexible, isn't it?

I would call this a chaise longue.
Me, too.

But it's related to the couch.

From coucher, the French word
to recline or lie down.

Some people call them fainting
sofas, and you can see why.

It's just made for the job.

Exactly. Tightly laced into
your girdle,

you might need a moment
to recline and relax.

It's very nice down here, actually.

Tudors had something like this,
but they called it a daybed.

That's the term
that Shakespeare uses.

The implication is
that it's in the bedroom.

But they move out
into the living room. Absolutely.

And become known under
a different term, sofa.
From a Middle Eastern word, suffah.

But the key thing, sofa,
couch, whatever,

is that these are sociable
pieces of furniture.

They're for you and a guest.
Thank you very much.

This particular daybed
is in the rococo style,

which flourished in western Europe
from around 1700 to 1780.

Rococo wasn't a hard and fast
style, but rather a mood.

There are several ways to spot
a rococo piece when you see one.

Seashells and back-to-back C-shaped
scrolls are always a big clue.

As are carved cabriole legs and
light, flourishing, feminine lines.

Thomas Chippendale was a craftsman

whose name was not only
universally associated

with English rococo furniture,

he was also the first designer

to have a furniture style
named after him.

Thomas Chippendale must be the
world's most famous furniture-maker.

But was this down to
his craftsmanship, or was it

the promotion of his business
in the form of this enormous book?

I've come to Dumfries House
in Scotland,

home to one of the
finest collections

of Chippendale
furniture in the country.

Some of its pieces
are worth a fortune.

The Chippendale
historian David Jones

is going to show me
what makes them so special.

So, here we've got about 10 pieces
of proper Chippendale furniture,

and there's only 700
of them in the whole world!

That's right, yes.

And 50 of them in this house.
That's amazing, isn't it?

Why is he so influential, then?

He gives his name to
a whole sort of - it's shorthand

for a particular type
of Georgian furniture, isn't it?

Yes, and it's a brand name that
people use from Mexico City to China,

really, and it's in
everybody's consciousness.

I think that was largely because
he was such a brilliant marketer -

he produced what was the first
catalogue of furniture in 1754.

It's called Chippendale's Director.
That's right.

"A collection of elegant and useful
designs of household furniture."

We take the phrase
"household furniture" for granted,

but it was coined by Chippendale.

Oh! "Household furniture."

That's the first use of the phrase.
Yes. That's interesting.

And you can get bookcases, writing
tables, breakfast tables, etc, etc,

but you can also get them in the
Gothic, Chinese or the modern taste.

Yes. It's like the IKEA
catalogue, really. Well, yes,

that's the old joke,
everybody says, yes.

So, it's wrong to think
of Chippendale being this lonely,

tortured, creative genius
sitting in his studio,

making everything himself by hand.

Really, he was picking up other
people's ideas and amalgamating them

and popularising them.
That's right, yes.

To have some in the 1750s
was to be thoroughly modern. Aw!

But the Earl of Bute,
who bought these for this house,

he thought they were
a bit TOO modern...

We're used to this kind of thing,

but to the Earl of Dumfries,
it was...so, er, rather strange

that he said to his lawyer,
"Andrew, the furniture is monstrous."

THEY LAUGH

But he obviously stuck with it,
because it's still here today. Yes.

So, how can you tell if your
Chippendale is one of the 700?

You need the original documents -
the bills, at least correspondence -

to verify that the furniture
was supplied by Thomas Chippendale.

And if you've got one of the 700,
you're quids in, aren't you? Yes.

How much was this
when it was for sale five years ago?

Similar chairs have
gone for a million, er...

We're touching a £1 million chair!

Chippendale created
a brand by publishing The Director,

a pattern book.

It won him many commissions,
and meant that

people across the country
could get their local carpenter

to make them a piece of
furniture in the Chippendale style.

It was this that
sealed his popularity.

The students here at the Chippendale
School, just outside Edinburgh,

are learning to make furniture
using traditional methods.

Anselm Fraser, who wears some really
crazy braces, is going to show me

how to make a chair leg using
Chippendale's original techniques.

We've got the original
leg here, and my target

is to show you how
to make a leg like this. OK.

'I'm using a tool
called a scratch stock.

'It's got a curved
metal blade inside it,

'and it will carve a straight
line down the wooden leg.'

Oh, I've made a groove already!

And that's what I'm aiming for...
That's right.

So, it's quite simple...
Quite hard...

There's a dignity in labour,
isn't there? There is.

TOOL SCRAPES ON WOOD

Now, you're going to get fired,
Lucy... Am I doing it wrong?

No, you're slipping
all over the place.

But we can...
If you hold it in here...

What kind of wood are we using?
We're using mahogany.

In Georgian times,
it came in as ballast in the ships,

so you had the manufactured goods...

And guns. ..from Britain
to the rest of Europe,

and then you trooped off down
to the West Coast of Africa,

picked up your slaves,
took them to the Caribbean,

offloaded them
to the sugar plantations,

and then the ships would fall over,
you see?

Because in those days, you had a lot
of masts and ropes on the ships.

And unless you had a
lot of weight in the bottom,

erm, it would capsize.

So, they put this
mahogany in the bottom,

and the mahogany arrived
in the Port of London,

and Chippendale would walk down
there and see all this mahogany.

So, Georgian furniture is actually
quite tied up with the slave trade.

That's right, you see?

'Chippendale's workshop
in Saint Martin's Lane

'became one of the largest
furniture manufacturers in London.

'It employed 50 staff

'including craftsmen,
cabinet-makers and designers.'

How many years would it take
an apprentice joiner to get good?

Well, you would only do one
little bit all day, every day.

Until they got good at it?
Yeah, and you can see
we aren't doing that well.

But it doesn't really matter -
it gives you the kind of idea.

We'd cut the moulding on this side
and on this side

and then we would use
an old-fashioned thing

called a moulding plane
to work it in the middle.

This is not a science - it's an art.
It's a total art, a total skill.

I'm just nibbling away at the wood
very sensitively and gently...

..and creating a lovely,
round profile. Well done.

It just might take me 25 years.

'Thomas Chippendale
was a Yorkshireman

'from quite humble origins
and even with his success,

'he died a man of modest means

'because his aristocratic clients
didn't always pay their bills.'

Now go clockwise. Go clockwise.
OK. Now press hard.

I'm determined for you
to get to the bottom there.

I'm going to get
to the bottom of this.

Now, the next thing we would do
is we'd find a mortise chisel.

This is brilliant. You can see
how they actually did things.

Yeah, but to be honest,
I wouldn't be employing you.

I mean, you'd have to have
this finished by now.

And so we've got
our 18th-century glue pot here

of just one candlepower.

Now, this would make
a terrible smell, wouldn't it?

Terrible, terrible smell.

It was just animal bones
and the legend was

that the apprentice would be made
to pee in the glue pot.

What, to make it extra sticky?

Yes, the ammonia in the pee
made it extra sticky.

Brush, brush, brush-brush-brush.

And a little bit in there. Squadge
it in there. Squidge it in there.

Fantastic. Put that back in the pot.

Isn't that good? Have I
put it in the right way round?

Yeah, you've done everything
perfectly. Of course you have.

How long will that take to dry?
You don't have to use clamps.

This glue sets in about 30 seconds.
It's stuck already.

Of course, you made a good joint
to begin with. Ah.

So, you know, you've done
seven years of apprenticeship -

it's nice and snug inside.

Now you can see
how it's going to look.

There - look at that!

And mortise-and-tenon construction
is the way that old furniture works?

That's the way ALL of the old
furniture of that time was made.

And so it became fashionable
to own a household furniture

that wasn't just practical,
but beautiful.

To find out about
the evolution of the sofa -

once the status symbol
for the middle-classes,

now an essential in every home -

I've come to the Geffrye Museum
in London.

This museum has furniture
ranging from the 17th

through to the 20th centuries.

The social historian, Eleanor John,

is going to guide me
through the sofa's development.

We're starting
in the Regency drawing room,

where people would entertain guests.

So, is this a middle-class
person's sofa?

It is indeed, somebody
who's reasonably well-off,

but not aristocratic.

They're probably earning their
living, they are working.

Although it looks like
you're supposed to sit upright
and very properly on this,

sofas get a bit of a racy
reputation, don't they?

They do, they do, and the evidence
for this being that we can see them,

for example, in print culture that
show... And this one is captioned,

"Captain Jessamy learning
the proper discipline of the couch."

Look at her looking at him!

She's going to show him a thing
or two. Yeah, he is quite exposed.

He's lolling. It's not proper
to loll, really, is it?

No, it's a familiar
type of behaviour

that you can loll in your own home,

but you perhaps shouldn't loll
if you've got guests.

But this courtship is going rather
badly, isn't it? Yes, it is.

This is brilliant - she's saying,

"Come and sit down,
my dear little dandy,

"and I'll give you a bit
of white sugar candy."

Indeed. She's essentially saying
that she's feeling randy.

Yep, you know, offering
a nibble of something to him.

So here we've got quite a formal,
elegant piece of furniture,

but, actually, I love the fact
that it's leading to new forms

of permissive behaviour,
as Regency people see it.

We've got scenes
of seduction, of domination,

of flirtation taking place on sofas
- men and women sitting together.

The sofa was responsible
for a whole new form of behaviour.

For the first time,
men and women could sit

in close proximity to one another
rather than on individual chairs.

In addition to that, the luxurious
fabrics and upholstery

could be seen as titillating -
even encouraging of adultery.

But despite its racy reputation,

the sofa had firmly established
itself in the living room

by the early 20th century.

Right, now, we jumped forwards
nearly 100 years.

This is 1915, and this is very
different, isn't it? It is, it is.

The sofa's much more comfortable,
it's now got springs in it,

which is something that is
developed, I think, in the 1840s.

Can I boing it? Yes, do. Here we go.

We can't sit on this,
we can't walk on the carpet,

it's all far too fragile -
but I am going to feel

the fruits of mass production.

I'm going to boing the springs.

Ooh, that's comfortable.

THEY LAUGH

It's like a huge leap forwards,
isn't it,

from that uptight,
stiff-looking regency thing?

And now we've got
a modern piece of furniture.

This is the 20th century,
very clearly. Yup.

Informality and cosiness
and comfort.

By the swinging '60s, though,

modern furniture from Scandinavia
was all the rage.

Its focus was more
on style than comfort.

And while the trend towards simple,
clean, modern shapes continued,

there was something of a return
to comfort in the 1990s.

So, to sum up four centuries
of sofa history in a hand gesture,

it goes from like this,
to like this.

There's a great, sort of, loosening
of the moral fibres as time goes on.

The history of the sofa also
encapsulates the history of design,

mass production - we see all these
different styles coming and going -

but essentially it's from
formality to relaxation,

and that's what everyone now has at
home - a great, big, squashy thing.

But it's not just the sofa that has
travelled through the centuries

into everyone's home.

An object that was once
cutting-edge technology

and an essential when entertaining

is now in every kitchen drawer
in the country.

I'm meeting Peter Borrett, who has
an amazing collection of corkscrews.

Hello, Mark, good to see you.
Are you all right?

One of which is the first
patented corkscrew in the world,

and a British invention.

Why corkscrews?

Well, I think when you start looking
at all the diversity of design,

it becomes enchanting,
in some respects.

So, 300? 400? How many are here?

Approximately 300 in the cabinets
and then I've probably got
another 300 as well,

so I have around about
a collection of 600 pieces,

which is quite a lot
in ten years of collecting.

I can immediately spot a fantastic
collection of what was,

I believe, the first patent
for the corkscrew?

That's right. From the Rev
Samuel Henshall from Oxfordshire.

A man of the cloth -
I always find that rather curious.

Let me pull one out for you.
Thank you.

That looks like a special one.

Yes, it's the very first
British patent for a corkscrew -

in fact, the first patent
for a corkscrew in the world.

And this was 1795, wasn't it?
Correct.

And it's got a nicely turned handle
and the brush is not replaced.

No, it looks like the original
brush. Often you'll find

a corkscrew with a hole
where the brush would have been,

but the brush was used to dust off
the debris from the bottleneck,

clean off the labels
to see what you're drinking...

So, what's a piece like this worth?

Between £1,200 and £1,500,
so it's a desirable piece.

But, of course, you can get this type
of corkscrew for a lot less.

Oh, yes, you can. You can
get a simple Henshall type

for upwards of £25, £30.

Absolutely.
It's the sort of thing you see

in lots of flea markets
and antiques fairs.

So if this is the earliest,
I'm going to choose my favourite

and I'm afraid it has to be
these rather marvellous German,

what are they, later 19th-century,

early 20th-century
corkscrews with the legs?

I think they're sensational.
Let me pull out a couple for you.

Now, what are these fetching?
A couple of hundred quid?

Yeah. The more flesh,
the more desirable.
MARK LAUGHS

So the stripey ones
you've got in your right hand

in good condition are fetching
around about £200 currently. Right.

The half-flesh
would be around about 250

and there's collectors out there
that just look for ladies' legs.

So to speak. But I think something
that's more familiar to us is this.

This is the sort of thing you would
buy in a supermarket, isn't it?

I'd think a lot of people
would recognise it.

But this one certainly
didn't come from a supermarket.

No, this is, I believe,
a very successful British patent

which dates to 1888
by a prolific manufacturer,

of course, called
James Heeley and Sons,

and this is actually an improvement
to an earlier patent.

So that's this one. That's right,
that's the Baker patent from 1880.

It looks very similar,
but it seems the arms are not joined
- they're separate.

That's right, and Neville Heeley
just joined the two arms together
with a fulcrum arm.

Developing a classic
that's still with us today.

Yes, indeed. Well, I've never
seen one of these.

I've seen these a lot,
and I suppose they're worth £30, £40.

Probably 40 to 60
is a fair reflection.

So if that's worth £40-£60 in nice
condition, what's that worth?

Approximately £500.

£500, effectively, for a corkscrew
that doesn't really work very well?

Well, it doesn't work very well.

But that's often the case
in this market, isn't it?

It's the things
that didn't necessarily work,
that weren't commercially successful

and were withdrawn
that have become scarce

and thus, in many instances,
sought-after.

So, once you've uncorked
your tipple of choice,

you need something to pour it into,

and the Georgians had a glass
for every beverage.

Ale or claret for breakfast,

maybe a nip of brandy
to get you going.

For the men, hock and soda
to clear the mid-morning hang-over.

For the ladies,
Madeira and biscuits.

A flask of brandy
to survive a day's hunting,

then champagne, wine, port
and brandy throughout dinner -

the pattern was repeated until gout,
alcoholic poisoning

or death called a halt.

This is a lovely lot of glasses.

It is, and it would have been
enjoyed by the Georgians,

who did enjoy a drink, didn't they?
Absolutely, yes. This one,

this lovely wine glass here,

cos of the grapes, we can tell it
was used for wine. Absolutely right.

It looks quite small, doesn't it?
You think, "Mm, not much in there,"

but the idea was that
you had to drink that in one go

because perhaps there weren't enough
glasses for all the guests,

so if there aren't
enough glasses, no problem,

cos you say,
"I'll have wine, please,"

you're brought your glass, you go...
And then off it goes to be washed

and somebody else can use it
immediately after you.

And it's quite interesting
to see politics coming through

in wine consumption,
because, for example,

when we were at war with France,

there's less Bordeaux
being imported,

so they go for the sweet Spanish
wines coming up through Bristol.

So if you guessed this one
because of the engraving...?

What's that one got on it?

It's got pictures of...
Are those hops?

Yeah, I guess those could be hops.
It's an ale glass.

Any ideas about that one?
Rather curious shape. No.

Does it have a particular function?

It does indeed.
This is a toastmaster's glass,

and what's very interesting
is this bowl here,

which is actually quite solid.

It gave the impression of being
filled up so the toastmaster

could have toast after toast
after toast after toast -

these things were repetitive -
and after each one

he would bang it down on the table

and it gave its name -
the Firing Glass.

Is that cos it sounds like
the shot of a gun? Exactly.

So, this one's a lovely
champagne glass, isn't it?

Much more familiar to our eyes,
and, of course,

champagne can be drunk out of a coupe
- which is a bowl shape - or a flute,

and the coupe, of course,
reputedly and incorrectly

was apparently based
on Marie Antoinette's breasts.

She must have been quite
flat-chested if that's true.

I suppose she had,
I'd never thought of that.

Perhaps that might have been
a more suitable glass. Oh, dear.

SHE LAUGHS

These beautiful, intricate glasses
are all made of lead crystal,

a substance that was
accidentally discovered

by English glass-maker
George Ravenscroft in 1674.

Wanting to extend the working time
of molten glass,

he found that by adding
lead oxide it became softer,

easier to cut, and also highly
refractive and transparent.

This revolutionary discovery
made Britain the world leaders

in glass production
in the 18th and 19th centuries.

There were once 300 to 400 workshops

producing hand-blown
glasses like these.

Now, there are less than 20.

Stephen Pollock-Hill, owner of one
of the few remaining glasshouses,

is going to take me
through the processes.

Presumably, here, now,
they're blowing this bowl.

Yes, this is a Georgian glass
made in lead crystal.

GLASS CHIMES

The English invented this -
George Ravenscroft in 1674 -

and had a monopoly
for over 100 years.

'Having gathered a mass
of molten glass called "The Gob",

'the bit-gatherer places it in a
mould and blows to create a bubble

'which will form
the bowl of the glass.'

He's not blowing very much - I think
that's one thing that surprises me.

There is only a very gentle blow.
It is, yes.

The glass, at this stage,
it is still at about 800 degrees,

it's very malleable, so you only
need a very slight bit of blowing.

Many people think
it's like blowing a rubber balloon.

But the pressure,
just to expand it? Exactly.

'Once the ball has been formed,
the bit-gatherer

'passes it to the gaffer
who will create the final piece.'

Watching them make this glass,

it's almost like an advanced
form of choreography

in a strange way, isn't it?
It is, it is.

Everybody knows their part. It's like
a ballet, everybody has their role

and their particular skills, too.

I mean, how many of these
would be made an hour?

I would think you'd probably
make about 15, 20 an hour.
Good heavens above!

'This class is called
a "cast-on" glass

'because the stem is added -
or "cast on" -

'rather than being drawn
out of the glass.'

And this is, of course,
how it would have been made

in the 18th and 19th centuries?
Exactly, yes.

Incredible - I mean, we're
in a great big warehouse here,

but with four or five
of these furnaces on the go,

it must have been like
a vision from hell. Indeed.

'Seeing the amount of work that
went into producing Georgian glasses

'makes it easy to understand
why they were so expensive to buy.

'But what's interesting now
is that for many,

'their antique value
is surprisingly low.'

If you'd like to spruce up
your dining table

with some new wine glasses,
don't head towards the High Street,

head towards
an antique centre instead,

because you'll find you can add some
unique charm to your dining table.

Made in the 1820s,
this is hand-blown, hand-assembled

and hand-cut with this incredibly
intricate pattern around the bowl.

You have the slice cut at the base,

these wonderful crosshatch
diamonds in the middle -

you could have this handmade
antique for less than £20.

There are hundreds
of antique markets and fairs

where you can pick up antiques
and collectables just like these.

Following on from the glass-making
innovations of the 17th century,

spectacular new light
fittings emerged.

They included the most
luxurious of all -

the cut-glass,
lead-crystal chandelier.

The light-scattering properties
of its highly refractive glass

quickly became popular amongst
the wealthy as a status symbol

to impress their guests
whilst entertaining.

Now, people say that
the hall of mirrors at Versailles

in the late 17th century
is the first room in history

that would have had anything
approaching reasonable light levels

after dark, and that was because
it had a mirrors on the walls

and chandeliers all down the middle,

and all the glass is said to reflect
the light of candles ten times more.

Absolutely, and a lot of that -
in fact, all of that -

is owed to the development
of lead crystal

by George Ravenscroft in the 1670s.

This allowed you to create these
fantastically elaborate chandeliers,

each with drops which were
cut with further facets

which reflected
and refracted the light.

The first time we hear
the word "chandelier"

being used in England is in 1714,

and I think the 18th century is
the age of the chandelier?

It is, and chandelier, the term,

is derived from the French term
"chandelle", which is tallow candle.

Makes sense. Often because
the candles were so expensive

it would have felt like actually
burning money to light them,

so you wanted them
as low as possible

to provide as much light
as possible,

and there are stories
from the French court

of people walking around in big wigs
and setting fire to them

on the low-hanging chandeliers.

But, yes, that's exactly it,
it was a way of burning money,

but it was a way of showing
your wealth and status.

Hanging one of these
in the centre of a room

wasn't really all about enabling
you to see what was going on,

it was also a display
of your wealth and your status.

"Look at me, look at my
wonderful chandeliers,

"aren't they brilliant?"
Quite literally.

This handcrafted chandelier
in Woburn has 102 glass drops,

102 glass stars and 24 candles.

To light it for just one evening

would have cost three quarters
of a ploughboy's yearly wage.

And a workshop in Kent is one
of the few places left in the country

where chandeliers like this
are still made.

What a treasure trove.
So we've got all sorts here.

You know, a couple
of hundred years' worth

of chandeliers, lanterns, all types.

Company owner David Wilkinson
is showing me around.

Here they restore priceless
antique chandeliers

and also make bespoke pieces.

A customer came to me and they'd
seen a picture in my old brochure -

this is one we did back in the '80s
- and it was this one.

It's a late Victorian, early 1900s
chandelier by F&C Osler.

Well, we restored this
chandelier 20 years ago

and I don't know where it is now.
So you know it intimately, in a way.

I remember it well,
but we've got nothing to work to

so we've had to make
everything from scratch.

Just this photograph... Just this.
..has led to this design? It has.

So, really, you're continuing this
fantastic tradition, this heritage,

that Britain and many other
countries in the world have lost,

but had during
18th and 19th centuries.

That's right. Fantastic.
This is something I'd love to see.

A hand-blown lead-crystal bowl
is sliced in two

with a precision-tipped
diamond-bladed saw.

The desired pattern is then marked
up by hand on to the bowl,

ready to begin cutting.

So this must be a pretty scary
moment, then, that first cut?

Yes, the first cut is always
the most difficult to do.

It's remarkably quick. It really
eats into the glass, doesn't it?

Yes. We call it roughing, but it's
full of chips and scratches,

but it does carve
the glass away quickly.

In each chandelier,
there are 50 hand-cut crystal pieces

and about 100 drops and buttons.

So tell me what's going on here.
This is the smoothing stage.

Tony is just going over the cuts
now that he's roughed in

and it's putting
that sharp definition in

and it's taking all that
roughness out.

Well, I admire him -
I can't even draw a straight line,

so the fact of holding
this bowl there

and following that on a wheel
spinning like that is incredible.

How long does it take to learn
something like this?

I say that once my cutters
have learnt...

They've been cutting
for seven years,

they are really good cutters.

This pair of chandeliers
will take ten craftsmen

well over a year to make
and will cost over £100,000.

So this is the final stage, then?
Yes, this is the polishing.

This is caulking,
and we use a mixture,

which is like
a pumice powder and water.

That abrasion effectively
creates the sparkle and brilliance

that you would expect from
a chandelier of this quality.
That's it. Fantastic.

'Each chandelier has more than 200

'individual brass castings
and turnings,

'many of which are handmade
using this antique lathe.'

So, Ian is now...

There's a bare casting and he's
hand-tracing it in this lathe,

which means he's using a chisel

and he's taking this roughness off
the edge and it will all be smooth.

This piece, I'm sure,
is very integral to the chandelier,

but what intrigues me at the moment
is the lathe he's using.
This is an antique machine.

It is, yeah. It's a lovely old
Triumph lathe from about 1908.

My father bought it.

So if this was bought by your father,

how many generations of your family
have been involved in this business?

Well, I'm the third generation.

And what about your children?

Are they interested?
Yes, I have three daughters,

they're all working
in the business at the moment.

My oldest daughter will take over
the business from me. Fantastic.

Chandeliers were not
the only objects

that demonstrated your status
and position in society.

The well-off Georgian's dinner table

positively groaned under the weight
of a new obsession - silverware.

This is all very sparkly
and marvellous, isn't it?

You couldn't fail to be impressed
when you came to dinner and saw this.

You've got to imagine
seeing this by candlelight.

All of this stuff is intended
to sparkle and magnify what's
available. Quite magnificent.

These are amazing, these early
Georgian fruit containers.

They are indeed, and made by
Paul de Lamerie, an incredibly...

In fact, perhaps one of Britain's
best-ever silversmiths.

Just look at the workmanship -
the chasing, the embossing -

everything about it is meant
to show wealth and status.

This is really Georgian bling.
I agree.

Now, this table has been set
out for a Georgian dinner,

which means that half
of the food, essentially,

would all be on the table
at the same time,

so it was like a buffet - you would
take what you wanted from
the different dishes.

What happens in the 19th century is
that the new way of dining comes in,

and that's our modern
idea of courses.

And as you get numerous courses,

you need more and more cutlery
to eat them with,

and cutlery-makers are delighted
about this. Of course.

and they promote the idea that
you need a set of butter knives

and fruit knives and dessert forks
and fish knives,

but there is also something
a bit nouveau riche about this

and the old aristocracy
stick to their good Georgian silver

and so they are not so keen
on this idea of the utensils,

and that's why there's something
inherently middle-class
about the fish knife.

But they didn't just stop there,
did they?

There were plenty of other tools
for every single task.

Oh, here we got an array
of different utensils.

Asparagus tongs.

Ah, I guess the idea is

you put the individual bits
of asparagus in there.

Absolutely. Pick it up
and pull it along.

Pick up a whole lot of them at once.
Firmly gripped in the jaws.

How about this? That's got to stump
you. This is brilliant.

This is a cheese shovel.
You shove it into the cheese

and then you press this
little lever to push it off.

Absolutely. And what's remarkable,
I think, about all this

is not only are the display pieces -
the table centrepieces -
made out of silver,

but each and every single one
of these is made out of silver.

That really is quite a lavish event.

But, of course, another thing
they would have done is mark

each and every piece of their cutlery
with a family crest.

Like this one, which has a B on it
for Duke Of Bedford.

There's his coronet.

And sometimes you can date spoons
because all that family business

has been put on either
the front or the back,

depending on the period,

because earlier spoons were
placed that way up on the table.

And it was something to do
with cuffs, wasn't it?

Yes, it's so you couldn't catch it
and knock it over with your
silly frilly cuff.

But later,
they are placed that way up

so the family information migrates

and it appears on the top
where we'd expect to see it today.

Not all silver will have
a crest or a coat of arms,

but nearly every piece of British
silver will carry a hallmark.

The term "hallmark" originates here

at the Goldsmith's Assay Office
in London.

Since 1300, people have brought
their gold and silver to this hall

to be assayed - which means tested -
and marked.

10,000 objects
pass through here every day,

to be verified using
both the latest technology

and ancient methods
dating back centuries.

I'm a meeting David Merry,

who has been an assayer
here for over 40 years.

Good morning, David.
Nice to see you again.

Thank you for letting me interrupt
your day. Tell me what you're doing.

This is actually known
universally as The Touchstone.

Everybody knows the word,
Touchstone pictures, for example.

This is exactly where
it comes from, yeah.

And English phrases like "the acid
test", "coming up to scratch",

all come from this process,
believe it or not,

and they were injected
into the English language,

as the word "hallmarking" is -
coming into the hall to have your
work hallmarked.

Good heavens above.
So how does it work?

I notice little
scratch marks on here,

presumably you scratch the item...?

Alongside the touchstone tests,

we have what we call
touch needles or touch keys.

So these are known standards
of different silvers.

We use these as a reference point

to know exactly
what we're rubbing against it.

So if the reaction's
exactly the same,

we can calculate that it's
likely to be the same thing.

We're going to take
this silver candlestick.

This is purported to be
a higher standard -

this is actually not sterling,

this is the old British standard,
Britannia silver.

That's 958 parts of silver
within the alloy mix

as opposed to sterling
which is an 925.

Yeah, well done, yeah.
You've been doing your homework!

I'm just going to
apply a silver sulphate

and that's probably the one
that's best to judge.

If it's low standard,
we very much get a grey stain,

but if it's OK - up to standard -
we wouldn't get any stain at all.

And straightaway
you probably can see

there's just a slight resemblance
to the one on the right,

which shows me that it's at least
below 925 standard.

'It's only after exacting scientific
standards have been met

'that an object can be given
its final stamp of approval -

'the hallmark.'

And there it is.
Can you tell us what they all mean?

Because each individual mark
that makes up a hallmark

actually has its own meaning.

Exactly, yes. There are four parts
to the English hallmark,

which is what we call
a full hallmark.

We have the lion passant
for sterling silver,

it was introduced in 1540, by a
couple of workers that worked here
from Henry VIII's reign,

because they didn't quite trust
the assay master at the time,

so were sent to spy on him.

The second mark is actually
the millesimal fineness.

This actually tells the consumer
exactly the percentage of silver

they're getting in the article.

Then the original leopard's head,
which was the old king's mark

from Edward I's reign and also
has become the town mark for London,

and then the date letter for this
year, which is an N this year,

which enables you guys to date
silver to a specific date.

But Goldsmiths don't just
assess new metal -

they also help the police
track down illegal items.

This is the things that you'll
be more interested in, I suppose.

Absolutely, this looks
like a box of delights.

One of the oldest pieces
in our collection,

this is dated from 1580,
Elizabeth I's time.

Unfortunately, in 1580,
coffee didn't exist in the UK,

so there's one problem for you.

Although adulterated, that's still
scarce thing, isn't it? The body?

Oh, definitely, yeah. Very rare.

Well, this is what
it would have looked like

before somebody decided
to turn it into a coffee pot.

Which must have been related
to fashion, I suppose.

Yeah, it was quite a normal process
to do, and rather innocently.

Very few are actually
what we call real, pure fakes

and this is a good example of that.

George II fruit basket,

but, unfortunately the only piece
of the Georgian silver on here

is actually that circle there
with the hallmark on it. Good Lord.

Now, they used to do this
and it was called duty dodging,

cos throughout the Georgian period
and the Victorian period,

you used to have to pay a tax
on the amount of silver weight.

So what they used to do
is send small items in,

get them hallmarked, send them back.
They'd pierce that hallmark out,
inlet it into something much bigger.

So this part is Georgian silver
and the rest of it is...?

Probably Victorian, I should
imagine. And that is quite common.

The antique silver market
is booming right now

because the price of silver
is incredibly high,

but if you like the look
but can't afford the price tag,

consider silver plate.

These two pieces
are excellent examples.

This is a Walker & Hall entree dish

and at £29,
it's remarkably good value

for a piece that revives the Georgian
period during the early 20th century.

And if a modern look
is more your thing,

this piece, made by Mappin & Webb,
again silver-plated,

and for a price tag of £60,

it's a period piece
that won't set you back a fortune.

For me, these both represent
excellent value

and will just add that individual
hallmark of quality.

As the evening draws to a close,

it's time for some
after-dinner entertainment.

To succeed as a true Victorian lady,

I would have needed to be
an accomplished pianist.

However, help in the form
of new technology was on its way.

No piano tonight, then?

No. Because, of course, before,
you would have been singing.

I would have, yes.
As a well-educated young lady,

that was one of my important skills,

entertaining the family
after dinner on the pianoforte.

But I guess I've been mechanised.
I'm afraid you have.

The 19th-century saw
the mechanisation of music.

This is known as the graphophone,
which was developed

from Thomas Edison's phonograph,
which was developed in 1877.

What songs have you got then?
How does it work? Let's have a look.

What have we got? You have a choice.

We have The Rainbow Song or we have
Can't See You, by Albert Gumble.

Well, I'm going to
reject Albert Gumble

and choose The Rainbow Song.

Well, he's not up there
with the greats

like Mozart, Beethoven
and the rest, so here we go.

On goes the wax cylinder.

We have to wind it up first,
which I'm going to do very gently.

There we go.

TINNY MUSIC PLAYS

LAUGHING: Do you like it? Clearly.

Well, it's just sensational,
isn't it? We have a whole band
here in the room.

Well, that's it, that was the great
innovation, of course.

You could mass-produce these things,

we could all enjoy music
in our homes.

A piece like this would
have cost about £2 in 1905.

In today's money, it's about £115,

so I suppose in many ways
you could think of it as

a digital music player today

that we might go out
and buy from the high Street.

Let's make the most of it.
SHE SINGS ALONG

I have two left feet,
I think I might leave you to that.

I think you're 30 years too late,

you're getting a little bit
art deco here.

SHE SINGS ALONG

After-dinner entertainment
changed immeasurably

with the invention of the phonograph,

which went on to become
the more familiar gramophone.

And a unique collection of
these ground-breaking machines

are crammed into a semi
in the Northeast.

I'm meeting Ken Priestley,
the proud owner.

Ken, hello. Hello, Mark.
Pleased to meet you.

Thank you very much, thank you.
Come in, young man.

Oh, my goodness, gracious me.

Oh, I don't believe it!

This forest of horns here -
it's absolutely incredible.

What on earth started
this fascination?

Oh, it's... Oh, nearly 40 years ago

I had an aunt
who was living in a flat

and she asked if I could hire
a van for her and move her.

And when we loaded the van up,

she brought out what
I thought was a small sewing machine

which turned out to be
an Edison Gem phonograph.

Oh, of course, because
they had the little domed cases.

Absolutely, spot-on.
In fact, that's the one over there.

Oh, yes? As I say, that I thought
was a sewing machine.

And the Gem, of course, was one
of the more popular models.

It was one of the less expensive
models, something that was affordable

and one of the ones you find
most commonly today.

And the value for this
I'm thinking around £300, £400?

For a Black Gem, yeah, but if you go
on to something like the Red Gem

then you're talking
two or three times the price.

OK, so if that was your first one,
what's the earliest one you've got?

Well, the earliest one
is the Edison standard, there,

which is 1899, so it's 113 years old
and it's still working.

But Edison's phonograph wasn't the
format that actually perpetuated -

it didn't last very long, did it? No.

Because his major competitor had
arisen... Which was the gramophone.

Can you please show me one of those?
Yeah, certainly, come on over here.
Thank you very much.

We've got one that's typical of
the period - the HMV horn machine.

This is what people recognise,

even if they don't know
anything about gramophones

they'll recognise it.

You couldn't mistake it for
anything else. What's the value
for something like this?

It's a very nice oak case
with some nice carving down here

and an original period brass horn.

That one would probably be
about £700, £800 worth. OK.

If you look at the HMV sign,
you'll see Nipper the dog

sat in front of a gramophone,
which we call the dog model,

which was very, very early.

Now, on that one, you can pay
probably £4,000 or £5,000 for.

You mentioned Nipper the dog...

Come over here, I'll show you.
Excellent.

There's father and son here.

Yes, father and son,
but very, very different dates,

because I think he's quite new.
Absolutely spot-on.

I'm hoping you're going to tell me
he's original. He's original.

Absolutely spot-on, Mark.
Not a common thing. Oh, no, no.

Very rare, actually,

cos these were only really
made for shop display.

So what's he worth?
Probably about 400.

Of course, it's called His Master's
Voice because the entire idea was...

He was listening
to his master's voice.

But I see, like most collectors,

it's not just the objects
themselves that interest you,

it's the whole paraphernalia.

Whatever is connected
or associated with them.

Including the tins that you
would buy to keep needles in.

They come in all shapes and sizes

and it's usually the shaped ones
that are more collectable.

Edison Bell one. A lot more valuable.

Yeah, the average, run-of-the-mill
price is probably £5-£10

for an HMV tin in good condition,
but the Bell one today...

100, 150. Good Lord.

In 30-some years, it's the only one
I've got. Really? Yeah.

From the Victorian
equivalent of the iPod

to a device as revolutionary
as the television -

Magic lanterns were many people's

first experience
of a moving image,

something that could
be quite terrifying.

The collector Mervyn Heard
is putting on a show for us.

What is it? I don't know.

MERVYN MOANS SPOOKILY
Oh!

O-o-oh!

Look. Look who's there.

It's the dance of the skeletons.

Although the Magic Lantern was very
popular during the Victorian era,

its origins go back
to the middle of the 17th century

when it was used
by conjuring priests

to literally put
the fear of God into people

and during the 18th-century,
there were a lot of people

travelling around doing shows
at fairs, public hangings

and other places
of festive merrymaking,

presenting horrific images
like this, for example.

Ah!

This is the oldest slide
in my collection.

It dates from about 1790.

It's a French slide
called The Dentist,

so I'll do this in French for you.

MERVYN MIMICS PAINED GROANING

Actually, it was during
the French Revolution

that the magic lantern
took off in a big way

with something called
the Phantasmagoria.

Phantasmagors, as they were known,
used not just one lantern,

but several lanterns
so people didn't actually know

where the images
were really coming from.

They also used electric shocks
which they sent through the soles

of their audience's feet.

Here they come. A whole host
of ghosts and goblins

rising up out of the smoke.

They're very amusing, these slides,
but I guess they would have been

quite terrifying if you'd never
seen a moving picture before.

Well, I think these are,
yes, amusing to us,

but quite terrifying at the time.

It must've been fun
to get a machine at home.

Yes, of course, because by the 19th
century, you were able to buy these,

so perhaps the father would stand
and operate the lantern itself -

oh, my goodness, that's a grin -

while the children would make sounds

and illustrate it
and bring it to life.

Fantastic show, Mervyn.
Thank you very much.

That was super spooky!
Tell us all about your machine.

OK, Well, this is a machine
from around about the 1890s.

It's a typical Victorian Biunnial -

that is to say it's really
two lanterns in one.

But with a machine
like this you could do

all kinds of spectacular
special effects

by cross fading and superimposing
images and doing all those things

which we thought we'd invented
in the 1960s and '70s.

In its own way, this is
a precision instrument

and I'm presuming because
it's such a fabulous quality,

it's going to be worth...
I'm going to say around £3,000.

More or less, yes,
three and a half, I would say.

But a small child's one
can be picked up for under £100

with some nice printed slides in
a box. They're not so expensive.

Oh, yes. Probably about £80,
something like that.

From the first moving images
to relaxing on a sofa.

From owning a set of cutlery
to using the humble corkscrew -

all things we do today
without a second thought.

And together, these objects
tell a potent tale of our past.

They've informed the way
we live and entertain today,

shaping not only how we behave,
but who we aspire to be.

Next time on Antiques Uncovered,

I'll be ordering from a menu
with a tragic past...

April 14 was when
Titanic hit the iceberg.

..and discovering
the lost art of globe-making.

'While I visit a train set
with a difference...'

It's a bit crazy, isn't it?
It's totally mad.

'..as we look around the world
of travel antiques.'

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd