Porcelain

Question: My father was given this 17-inch-high porcelain bird as payment for legal services in the 1920s or 1930s. I've no idea of its age or origin and would love to know its value, though I would never part with it. Answer: Your 19th-century polychrome, porcelain pheasant, symbolizing beauty and good fortune, was made in China specifically for export to the West. Your lone figurine - the birds were usually made in pairs - is worth around $1,000 to $1,200, said dealer Robert Mascarelli, co-author with his wife, Gloria, of Warman's Oriental Antiques (Wallace-Homestead)

In the 18th and early 19th century, Philadelphia was famed for many crafts, notably furniture and silver. But it also boasted other artisan distinctions, including the first successful porcelain company established by one Ellis Tucker. Next Friday at the Ludwig's Corner Firehouse, Pook & Pook Inc. will offer three groupings of Tucker porcelain at the first session of its two-day fall- catalog sale, including a tea service in a so-called spider pattern. Just to stop any jokes about the sale being a Tucker-ware party, be it noted that the service, including a couple of dozen pieces, is likely to sell for $5,000 to $8,000, according to Pook & Pook's Ted Wiederseim.

Eight relatives of a childless Baltimore couple will share a multimillion- dollar windfall as a result of the sale of hundreds of pieces of porcelain found in a tiny house in suburban Baltimore. Chinese porcelains collected in the 1940s and 1950s by Frederick J. and Antoinette H. Van Slyke were sold at auction last spring at Sotheby's in New York for $5.7 million. Many of the 201 pieces brought three to 10 times their estimates. This week, the Van Slykes' 18th-century European porcelain tableware and figure groups from such factories as Meissen, Fulda, Sevres and Vincennes are expected to bring an additional $1 million at Sotheby's.

The highest standards in porcelain have always been Chinese, and when you see the exhibition "Joined Colors" at the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, you'll immediately understand why. These 79 pieces represent an extraordinary marriage of sublime form, exquisite decoration and brilliant color. "Joined Colors," which runs through Nov. 28, concerns itself with decoration and symbolism in imperial Chinese porcelain of the Ming (1368-1644) and Qing (1644-1911) dynasties. The discussion is somewhat technical at times, but the pieces themselves, many quite small, always pull you back to the level of pure delectation.

Auctions today and tomorrow could be the answer to the prayers of collectors of pewter and Roseville porcelain. In addition, a third sale tomorrow liquidating the real estate and contents of the Reading Holiness Camp Meeting Association will offer the chance to get some old-time religion. The pewter, five important pieces from the United States and Europe, is a highlight of the second session of a two-day antiques sale by Pook & Pook Inc. that will begin at 10 a.m. tomorrow at its Downingtown gallery, 463 E. Lancaster Ave. It's tempting to look down on pewter as the poor man's silver, and tomorrow's session also features lots of sterling, including a Reed & Barton seven-piece tea service made about 1937 and expected to sell for $12,000 to $18,000.

Glaciers may appear to be immobile, but they flow like highly viscous rivers, an improbable quality that Paula Winokur has captured in the porcelain sculptures she's showing at Helen Drutt Gallery. This series, inspired by a trip to Alaska, consists of wall-mounted and free-standing pieces. Typically, they juxtapose smooth, faceted sections with a furrowed part that suggests weathered ice moving down a slope. Although the sculptures are all white, Winokur has enlivened them by created several striking contrasts.

Next week in Amsterdam, Sotheby's will begin selling 76,000 pieces of Chinese Export porcelain recovered from a circa 1725 shipwreck off the coast of present-day Vietnam. Because it was bound for the western market, the cargo reveals the era's fads and fashions in Europe, and precise details about the arduous journey made by goods in demand. The tale of the Cau Mau shipwreck involves connoisseurship, a treasure-hunting adventure suitable for television, and the legendary East India Trading Company (which itself has recently resurfaced in Pirates of the Caribbean dialogue)

William J. Kazmar, 79, a blue-collar worker who became a renowned wildlife artist and porcelain art sculptor, died of heart failure Tuesday at John F. Kennedy Hospital in Atlantis, Fla. Mr. Kazmar lived in Collingswood, N.J., and had been vacationing in West Palm Beach, Fla. He was born in South Philadelphia. He joined his father making and restoring furniture when he was a teenager. After high school, he worked as a steamfitter at several local shipyards during World War II. After the war, Mr. Kazmar worked briefly as a machinist for Boeing Vertol and then opened an antiques and furniture restoration business with his wife, Barbara Mae Neville Kazmar, in Collingswood, where they lived for 52 years.

"I ate a fine meal at the Ritz from it last Sunday in London," said Capt. Michael Hatcher, referring to the Chinese porcelain that he, his partner Max de Rham and a team of divers brought up from the depths of the South China Sea in 1983. London's Ritz Hotel bought a service for 24 at the auction of Hatcher's porcelain in Amsterdam last spring, and the hotel now charges a premium when it uses the china for special dinners. Hatcher made his comment when he came to New York last month to promote the sale, at Bloomingdale's, of more china from the Nanking cargo.

Chinese export porcelain is collected in many parts of the world, and at a recent pottery-and-porcelain sale at Sotheby's in New York there were Italian, English, Canadian and South American buyers in the salesroom. The top lots, however, were bought by Americans, and there was spirited competition for the best pieces. The sale netted $1.5 million for 486 lots, the majority of which was the porcelain made in China for export to the West in the late 18th and 19th centuries. About 17 percent of the objects were not sold, but most of those were disposed of in private sales in the week after the auction.

Stuff a stocking with one of these inspired teacups: the comfy mug, handmade bone china outfitted with a muffler knitted by the artist's mother, $22 for 6-ounce mug; or the double-walled Danish cup with the pattern of a Norwegian sweater, $34 per set of two; or a reindeer mug of white porcelain with silicone bands to protect fingers while sipping, $22. - Maureen Fitzgerald All available at Premium Steap, 111 S. 18th St., 215-568-2920....

Named "the best lentils in the world," by cookbook author Patricia Wells, these green lentils from Le Puy en Velay, France, are so much tastier than the grocery store variety. If you have been trying to work a lentil soup or salad into your regular rotation, these lentils will convince you. Not only are they delicious, the dark green lentils with blue marbling are also quite beautiful. - Maureen Fitzgerald Green Lentils from Le Puy A.O.P., $10.95 for a 17.6-ounce package at In the Kitchen Cooking School, 10 Mechanic St., Haddonfield.

Casseroles travel safely to Thanksgiving dinner in this two-quart covered dish. Fits neatly into a woven wood basket, and the pair would make a nice gift to leave with the host.   For the gravy This lovely porcelain gravy boat is bordered with a garland of oak leaves, acorns and pumpkins - perfect for the annual autumnal feast. It holds 11 ounces of gravy, and it's microwavable and dishwasher safe.  

Catalog sales scheduled tomorrow and Monday will offer the opportunity to bid on fine Asian art and relics of bygone days - such as a Western Union stock ticker. In both cases, the catalogs are most easily accessed online. The fine Asian art - more than 1,200 lots, most of it Chinese and generally costly, with a dozen or more pieces expected to bring five-figure prices - will be offered by Freeman's beginning at 10 a.m. Monday at the gallery at 1808 Chestnut St. The catalog can be viewed at www.freemansauction.

When Stephanie Kao was 3, her family already knew she was an artist. With crayons and pencils, she drew bows and balloons and princesses. Now 27, the academic adviser at the University of Pennsylvania has moved beyond fairy tales to a different kind of Grimm. Her vibrantly painted orange skulls, first created for a "Day of the Dead" celebration in Old City, caught people's eyes at the Art Star Craft Bazaar at Penn's Landing this summer. "I bought them from a medical-supply company and just went crazy on it," she says.

Elinor McIntyre Gordon, 91, of Villanova, an antiques dealer who was an expert on Chinese export porcelain, died of a stroke Wednesday at her vacation home in Osterville, Mass. A native of New York City, Mrs. Gordon was a model as a young woman, appearing in Vogue, Harper's Bazaar, and Life magazines. In 1943, she married the investment broker Horace William Gordon Sr. She later told an Inquirer Magazine reporter: "When Horace and I were first married, I loved all antiques.

Martin Bernstein's entrepreneurial spirit seems to fit right in with the notion of national change. After more than 40 years as a hairstylist at Pileggi in Center City, Bernstein decided he wanted something more. So he put down his clippers and made what some might call an abrupt, even radical career turn - into real estate. "It started as a part-time interest and just continued to grow," says the native Philadelphian, recalling his initial foray into the buying, selling and refurbishing of properties about six years ago. "The reality is, I've always been fascinated with historic preservation and architecturally significant structures.

Auctions this weekend will offer bidders two chances to spruce up their spring wardrobes; a third next weekend will start the task of liquidating the long-hidden estate of a noted New Hope antiques dealer. All three promise to be generally affordable. The first wardrobe-makeover opportunity will begin at 10 a.m. tomorrow at V.F.W. Post 9788 in Horsham, where Andi Charkow will offer more than 800 lots of vintage clothing, textiles, and accessories, ranging from 1960s wedding gowns to an 18th-century priest's "fiddleback" chasuble.

Wedgwood, a mainstay of the venerable pottery firms in England's Staffordshire region, will celebrate its 250th anniversary this year. Its blue-and-white jasperware porcelain is one of the most easily recognized ceramics in the world. But the new year brought a shock to collectors when Wedgwood went into the British version of bankruptcy after three years of losses. The economic downturn has added further financial pressures as the demand for luxury goods dries up. Bryan Carnes of the North Staffordshire Chamber of Commerce and Industry said in an interview with the Guardian newspaper in Britain, "It's the third really famous brand to go into administration, after Spode and Royal Worcester.

Stay-at-home vacationers might consider spending the money they saved on gas at today's Freeman's Friday sale, beginning at 11 a.m. at the gallery, 1808 Chestnut St. Many of the 335 lots on offer are expected to sell for far less than what the owner of a gas guzzler would pay to drive to Maine and back. The two Russian commemorative silver-plate cups that open the sale - among about three dozen lots of silver (sterling and plate) and some pewter - are expected to sell for $100 to $150, according to presale estimates listed at www.freemansauction.