Antiques Roadshow guest blown away over inherited statue's staggering price tag

An Antiques Roadshow guest was left shocked after finding out an inherited angel statue that was owned by her family for years was worth thousands of pounds. During Sunday evening's episode, two sisters brought in the family heirloom for expert Andy McConnell to evaluate.

He began: "You know what the first thing I do when I see a Lalique Suzanne statue?" Andy asked as he picked up the statue. After checking for any damage, he expressed: "I'm delighted to tell you that this is what's called, perfect condition."

He then asked: "So tell me how does it fit in with you?," as one of the sisters responded: "Well we've known her, more or so our entire lives, we've just recently inherited her."

The guest added that the statue came from a great-aunt who went off to America to get married and took it with her, before posting it back to their dad in the 70s.

She continued: "She's actually been hidden away, we haven't seen her in a long time. When we grew up, she spent all of her time blu-tacked to the top of our television at home. One day our parents were sat watching the Antiques Roadshow and Eric Knowles was talking about an item very similar to this.

"Mum and dad sort of looked at the television and looked up at the Lalique and when they heard the value that was it for them."

The statue was then wrapped up and put away for safekeeping in an airing cupboard for two decades.

The expert told the guests: "So when it comes to evaluating Lalique, there are variables and one of the variables is of course the state of the market and at the moment, we're currently in a slight.

"The other one is the degree of opalescence, the collectors want them absolutely humming with opalescence and, to be honest, the lower section of her is quite opalescent," Andy explained as he pointed to the bottom of the statue.

"She's heading to really plain on that scale," he added before moving on to the much-anticipated valuation.

Andy revealed: "So valuation today is £6,000 to £8,000," as the sisters gasped in shock.

One of the guests said: "Oh wow," before adding: "Thank you very much," with the show moving onto the next valuation.

Antiques Roadshow is available to watch on BBC iPlayer.