As promised, here are my treasures from the Beau Monde Silent Auction.
On the Wednesday before the RWA conference, the Beau Monde held its wonderful all day conference with great workshops by the likes of Kalen Hughes and our own Janet Mullany. Kalen put the program together this year and did a fantastic job.
After the workshops there is a Regency Tea and silent auction. Beau Monde members donate items for the auction and we bid on them by writing down our bid. Then we watch to see if anyone tries to outbid us. Some of the items went through hot and heavy bidding, including my donations: An Illustrated Guide to London, 1800 by Mary Irene Cathcart Borer and Historical Maps of the Napoleonic Wars by Simon Forty. Now before you sigh and think how good it was of me to donate these books consider that I’d purchased them twice. Forgot I had them. My donations are always books I bought twice.
At the end of the auction I was standing by my items with pen at the ready in case anyone tried to outbid me. Obviously it was not a discerning crowd because only one person tried to wrest an item from my possession.
This fellow here, a lovely soldier figurine about six inches tall.
The dastardly person who tried to outbid me was KEIRA.
But she was really sweet, because she told me she planned to give the figurine to me as a surprise. Instead, I paid more money for it!
Anyway, he is a perfect suitor for my Veneta, the only Regency Royal Doulton figurine I’ve ever seen.
Some other treasures no one else recognized as Great Finds were the Wellington biography and the Wellington print. You can’t see it here but the print is in a lovely wooden frame.
Amanda can tell you that I’ve been a Wellington groupie since 2003 when we visited his country house, Stratfield Saye.
My favorite treasure of all, though, was the 1837 Architectural Print of London buildings. The name of the print is hidden by the mat, but a name on one of the buildings is Boston Insurance Office.
Even though this is later than the Regency I love these prints. I have several of them, including one of Apsley House (that Wellington groupie thing again) that I purchased from a print shop in London when we had about 5 minutes to shop.
Here is another treasure that arrived the day after I returned home. My very own Leonidas (aka Gerard Butler) talking action figure, complete with two heads and a blood spattered body. I pre-ordered it ages ago! He is sooooo lovely. And I didn’t even have to bid on him.
What treasures are lurking in your house?
What is that one Regency Item you would LOVE to own?
Pay me a morning call at my brand new website! See my news. Browse through my pages. Enter my contest to win two copies of The Mysterious Miss M, one for you and one for a friend.
Dastardly?? (snort) Please note, with deep gratitude, that I did not bid on the Wellington framed print. My instinct was to write a large amount so that I could not be outbid. Then when I saw your name on the sheet, I decided to be generous. And for all my forbearance I’m called dastardly? Next time, be prepared for a coat-off-rolled-up-shirt-sleeves kind of fight for every item.
How about a link to his Fabulousness?
I seem to be on an action figure acquisition thing lately. First Austen, then La Nora. I’m not sure I should even contemplate the GB one, but I have to know where I could possibly acquire it IF I choose to do so. 🙂
Wow, a Gerard Butler action figure? How did I not know this? Must buy now. I love my copy of The Prince of Pleasure and his Regency by JB Priestly that I managed to find at the Strand way back in the late ’80’s.
Love your items, Diane! And I’m delighted to know that I’m not the only one who accidentally buys two copies of a thing, and then donates one to the Beau Monde’s Silent Auction.
So…what Regency item would I love to own? The complete Kemble versions of Shakespeare. (Hard to find, and not cheap!)
What am I thrilled that I have? I think E Beresford Chancellor’s MEMORIALS OF ST JAMES’S STREET AND CHRONICLES OF ALMACK’S would be one…
Cara
Wow, you certainly cleaned up there! 🙂 Congrats!
And, ah, I really don’t suppose his short come off. . . ah, never mind. 😉
As for me, the only thing I can think of that I would want, Regency related are first editions of JA’s books. . . but I’m sure that’s way, way, way, out of my league to do. LOL 🙂
Lois
Cara and Lois, everything is possible in our dreams!
Keira, I truly did not recognize your forebearance! Here I thought I was the only one who wanted a print of Wellington!
Next year I am indeed going to have to stand by the auction items with my pen poised!
For His Fabulousness, just google Leonidas Action Figure talking. You’ll get a whole slew of them
I have the JB Priestly book, too, Elizabeth!
Am now going to look up Memorials of St. James Street and Chronicles of Almack’s on abebooks.com.
I must get the action figure! He would be a great match for my Marie Antoinette action figure–she only has one head, but it pops off then fastens back on (tacky, I know, but she was a present, so what can I do? LOL)
Oh, those were some good wins, Diane!
I have some lovely maps that I adore and a couple of original prints that I gaze at happily every day. The first one was a gift from my cp. She found it in Edinburgh and said it reminded her of my first book. The second one I ordered myself from London because it featured some Egyptian antiquities in the British museum that play a part in my second book.
Sensing a theme here! Now I need to find one to go with my wip!
Deb
who got Amanda’s Notorious Woman along with her Deathly Hallows!
Diane, OMG, he’s so cute! Thanks for the 300 action figure. I’ve ordered mine. 🙂 🙂
Regarding treasures: I snagged some of Dee Hendricken’s beloved books. They’re one and all books that I leaf through all the time; perhaps they’re dearer to me because they belonged to her first?! Hope her writing magic rubs off onto me.
who got Amanda’s Notorious Woman along with her Deathly Hallows!
I wanted to do that too, Deb! But though I looked, my stored didn’t have it on the shelves yet…
Cara
That is a lovely collection Diane! I don’t have a Leonidas doll. Last time ‘I think’, I collected any dolls was a collection of Gone with the Wind ones. And I loved those dolls. But a Gerald Butler one would be a nice one to have.
You asked: What treasures are lurking in your house?
How ’bout journals from past family members. Especially when you get to see all the juicy bits on their love life and things they done and thought no one will ever know about. I guess there’s a downside to keeping such things as personal journals. Because you get people like me inheriting and reading those things after someone passes away!
Cara wrote: The complete Kemble versions of Shakespeare.
Steal them from James Pickerloy, he has them! 😉 That man has a library that could make me lose my eyesight. From counting and all the reading of books 😉 . So much for men not reading and collecting books! For they do. 🙂
Nice haul! I’m happy Veneta has her HEA.
For Christmas, I’m getting my dh the Big Lebowski action figure set, complete with bowling ball.
What would I like from the Regency? A Stubbs, one of the good ones. And a fan. Um, teacups, too! Oh, and one of those straight-back settees, and a pianoforte, and a country house, and…
Janegeorge, rein it in! (although, come to think of it, dreams have no limits!)
Mallory, your journals are a true treasure, something no one else possesses.
You know someone who owns Kemble Shakespeare??? Wow.
I’m so glad I’m increasing the sales of the Leonidas Action Figure. I suspect Gerry should have a piece of the action. Just as I suspected, I’m not the only one who still plays with dolls!!
Steal them from James Pickerloy, he has them! 😉
Neat, Mallory! Wish I lived next door. 🙂
And I like Jane George’s idea — I want a country house too!
Cara
I’d like a country manor, too, but only if it came with a hall porter, a housekeeper, and a passel of servants. Otherwise, I’ll stick with my own house, which is barely manageable. 🙂
“Deb
who got Amanda’s Notorious Woman along with her Deathly Hallows!”
OMG, I came in the same box as Harry Potter!!! 🙂
I spent the whole weekend locked in my room reading Deathly Hallows. I can’t believe the series is done.
Diane wrote:
My very own Leonidas (aka Gerard Butler) talking action figure, complete with two heads and a blood spattered body.
Hmm. When you pull a ring on the back of the Leonidas action figure, does he respond by kicking you into a bottomless pit?
Elizabeth Kerri Mahon wrote:
I love my copy of The Prince of Pleasure and his Regency by JB Priestly that I managed to find at the Strand way back in the late ’80’s.
When I first began dating the woman who is now my lovely wife, she gave me a copy of The Prince of Pleasure–claiming that I could not hope to be an adequate boyfriend to her in any way without a thorough grounding in all things Regency. I still have it, which I guess means we have two copies; but mine has sentimental value, so I’m not giving it up.
Mallory Pickerloy wrote:
So much for men not reading and collecting books! For they do. 🙂
(Cough, cough, sputter, sputter.) Whoever said that had clearly never seen my house!
By the way–and please don’t take this the wrong way–has anyone ever told you that your name sounds like a character in a Harry Potter novel? 🙂 Don’t know what made me think of that…
Todd-who-has-taken-to-pointing-bits-of-chalk-at-his-students-and-shouting-“Stupefy!”-which-actually-seems-to-work-surprisingly-well