Saving the past

The Ivory Act was passed back in 2018. The trade in modern Ivory was made illegal in the U.K. under the CITES convention of 1975, some 47 years ago. At the time intelligent and considered measures were also put in place to protect Antiques which were made in part or whole of Ivory prior to 1947 under an exemption.

The Ivory Act of 2018 does not ban the trade in modern Ivory (that has already been banned in the U.K. for nearly half a century) but it does remove the exemption and protection for Antiques containing ivory, with only very minor and restrictive exceptions and then only upon payment of fees ranging from £20 to £250 per item. It will soon begin to be enforced.

In anticipation of this members of the wider public are sadly already either removing elements from Antiques, entirely breaking them up for scrap or simply discarding them. These three constant pressures will, if unimpeded, slowly and quietly erase and mutilate millions of historic items held in private collections throughout the U.K.

We are setting up the A.R.C to educate the wider public in valuing our shared heritage and to persuade them not to mutilate, scrap or discard all our history. We are also here to provide a “last resort” for individuals who simply do not want inherited Antiques which contain Ivory elements or those who have formed collections but now find they have no legal way of passing them on. In these cases the A.R.C is here to save what we can from being discarded, because once it’s gone it’s gone forever.

Please feel free to contact the A.R.C if you are within the U.K. with any Antiques related queries and we shall try to provide guidance and advice if we can. Together we can save all our history.