Antiques Roadshow guest speechless as ‘stunning’ brooch worth thousands came into family after burglary
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WARNING: This article contains spoilers from Antiques Roadshow. An Antiques Roadshow guest didn’t quite know what to say when she discovered just how much her inherited gold brooch was really worth. The BBC daytime series travelled to Ebrington Square in Derry to film another episode, meeting with visitors to examine their array of intriguing items.
Expert Joanna Hardy was on hand to meet a woman with a brooch that really caught the specialist’s eye. “There’s nothing better to brighten up a rainy day than by bringing me a beautiful brooch”, Hardy said. The guest explained: “I inherited it from my grandmother in 2003 when she passed away. Gran had had a gold ring, a Roman ring, which had been unfortunately stolen from her house in Dublin in the mid-1960s, and she had received some insurance money.”.
“And, at the time, my mum was in school with a girl called Madeleine Grima. So she suggested to Granny that why doesn’t she think about perhaps buying a piece of Grima jewellery. “Granny bought this piece and wore it often, and then when she died, she left it to me.”.
Hardy stated that Grima was a “very important person in the 1960s” and is often referred to as the “godfather of the modern jewellery world.”. “Up until 1960, jewellery had been quite sort of tired, there was no innovation, it was very samey, it was very dull”, she said.
“Andrew Grima joined his father-in-law’s workshop HJ and Company in the late 1940s. And one day, in the early 1960s, these Brazilian gemstone dealers came into the workshop and opened their suitcases and had these amazing big rocks from Brazil, all sort of natural stones.
