Newtonmore visitors have leading role in latest BBC Antiques Roadshow episode

The Antiques Roadshow featured a couple of star turns from the strath in last night's episode when the popular BBC show's cameras visited Brodie Castle in Moray.

Former Newtonmore Primary School headteacher Donald MacDonald and his wife Pat made the cut from the hundreds of visitors in search of good news with a Victorian brooch which they had brought along.

And a bracelet by the late jewellery designer Norman Grant, who latterly lived in Dulnain Bridge, starred in the weekly feature 'Basic, Better, Best Section' in which presenter Fiona Bruce puts three antique items into order by value.

The MacDonalds' agate gold with Cairngorm gem centrepiece brooch – found in the family home – caught the eye of the show's jewellery expert Susan Rumfitt.

Mr MacDonald said of the piece: “It brought the colour out in my wife’s eyes and I thought it only had one home.”

Ms Rumfitt responded: “How wonderful.”

She later asked: “So, on the reverse it is signed Mackay, it's 1868. It's actually dated and has got a lovely inscription there. But that name, it doesn’t correspond with your family at all?”

Mr MacDonald said he hails from Sutherland and 'Caithness and Sutherland are full of Mackays and Gunns...'.

Ms Rumfitt suggested: “Somewhere down the line, well, it must have belonged to a family member, mustn’t it?”

Mr MacDonald chipped in: “Or a gift from somebody”

The expert went on to explain: “Well, of course, Scottish agate jewellery became very fashionable after Victoria and Albert purchased Balmoral in 1852 and Victoria just loved walking around and seeing all the beautiful, vibrant colours of the agates on the estate, and then she would have them fashioned in pieces of jewellery.

“The centre stone is a Cairngorm. So you’ve got bloodstone, carnelian, you’ve got the grey stone which of course is common over Aberdeen way and they’ve all been put into the gold work so intricately. I think it's absolutely beautiful and of a very fine hand."

Mr MacDonald asked why the gold was not hallmarked.

He was told: “During the Victorian period, jewellery didn’t need to be hallmarked. It was basically the jeweller’s decision to hallmark or not.

"It’s not until we get into the 1970s that it becomes a legal requirement.

"This, of course, can make it quite difficult identifying some pieces and knowing exactly whether they’re nine or 18-carat gold as well. But this one has the look of 18-carat, because of the quality of it.”

And then to get to the crux of the matter for why most viewers tune in... the potential price.

Ms Rumfitt said: “So as far as an auction estimate is concerned, the market might have dipped slightly over the last couple of years. But even so, when good quality, vibrant pieces come along for sale, they do get good prices.

"So an auction estimate on this brooch, I would expect to be around £700 to £900. It could make over 1,000 because of the beautiful gold work. It really is lovely. Absolutely stunning.”

Mrs MacDonald reacted: “Gosh, I didn’t expect it to be as much as that”

The expert observed: “I could see this flying at auction.”

And Mrs MacDonald joked: “Well, we have three daughters who’ll be fighting over it!"

Later in the show, silver specialist and 'specialist in all things Scottish' Gordon Foster challenged Fiona Bruce to put three pieces of Scottish designer jewellery in order of value

Mr Fraser said: “Since we are in Scotland, I thought I would bring some pieces of Scottish designer jewellery to put you to the test. They are all pieces dating from the 1970s onwards and all in their own right artist-designed pieces”

“Nearest to you is a bracelet by a local lad he was called Norman Grant, and this is silver and enamel early 70s, 1973”

“Now he was quite a character and he took his jewellery to London. It's recorded that he sold things to the likes of Mick Jagger, Sandie Shaw so he struck the kind of spirit of the age with the whole fashion boom in London in the early Seventies”

Bruce said: “I like this one very much I must say”

And guessing the order, she said: “I am swayed by the Mick Jagger, went down to London, sold lots of them.”

So the TV star plumped for the Norman Grant bracelet's as the 'best' when it was in fact the 'basic' option with Graham Stewart's bird brooch being the best who Bruce had put as her 'better' second in value choice.

Mr Foster explained: “I mean I love Norman Grant’s work, the basic piece but you do see these turning up from time to time and that (Graham Stewart’s brooch) is a one of piece as far as I am concerned.”

"It edges it beyond Norman Grant, as much as I love Norman's work and I would never put him down as basic I can assure you of that."

Find out more about Norman Grant - jewellery maker to the stars and Grantown Hogmanay celebration organiser here

The Antiques Roadshow kicked off with some Highland dancing.

In last night's episode, Fiona Bruce met a Highland Games commentator who had brought along a collection of items including a weighty shot put, a heavy hammer and a brooch presented by Queen Victoria in 1848 while expert Lee Young came face to face with a three-legged ceramic toad and an Art Nouveau diamond brooch proved to be a show-stopper.

The episode is available on the BBC's iPlayer for the next month.

Do you want to respond to this article? If so, click here to submit your thoughts and they may be published in print.