Programme Details

Britain was once a nation of antiques collectors. The tide has now turned and the nature of collecting has changed? Is this to be mourned or celebrated?

With the reports over the past week of the shift in the antiques market towards more modern goods from the 20 th century, are we witnessing the death of Britain as a nation of antiques collectors? Where has our notion of the antique collector come from? And what does it say about our culture today, if we are investing in more modern goods in our homes? Let alone our identity? As the philosopher Jean Baudrillard says - I am the order I put into things.

Phillip Dodd hosts a lively debate about collecting objects down the centuries with a collection of guests - ranging from an out and out modernist - the lecturer and thinker Martin Raymond, the antiques lecturer Noel Ashby from the Sotheby's Institute to the leading historian of collecting, Phillip Blom.