The Art Market Is Back. Mind the gap.

As LAPADA pitches its annual tent in Berkeley Square, in the heart of London's Mayfair, the numbers say the room is full again, at least for the top bracket of the art world.

Mayfair is dripping with wealth. It is one of the most expensive and exclusive property markets in the world, so where better to pop up a fine art and antiques fair than where the wallets are fat and the offshore accounts fatter.

The neighbourhood's annual fine art and antiques marquee is up this week, just a few days after another London art fair staple, Frieze London and Frieze Masters, wrapped up. Organised by LAPADA, the Association of Art & Antiques Dealers and the UK's largest professional trade association for the sector, the fair brings together nearly 100 specialist dealers showing everything from fine art and jewellery to silver, clocks and sculptures spanning the ages. All in the hope their treasures find new homes.

Nosy as I am, I decided to take a wander.

First Impressions

Walking past Mayfair's fleets of Rolls-Royces and the iconic Annabel's club, you can't miss LAPADA's beautifully designed tent.

Mayfair landmarks, architectural details and unexpected characters are quite something to behold within Adam Ellis Studio’s fantastical design. Herons, zebras, peacocks, flamingos and acrobats in the foreground; iconic heritage buildings of Mayfair in the background; all under a dark blue sky and scattered clouds, screams: enter, and thou shalt part with more money than you wanted to.

But my attention went straight to the inconspicuous doors and the rather serious-looking people walking in and out of the fair. It was busier than I had expected, and perhaps an indicator that the dealers gathered might finally have timing on their side.

The wider art market has seemingly stopped sulking about the economy. Well, perhaps it's just a tad less sulky at either end of the price range, than in the years after the pandemic.

Global art sales rose 4% to $59.6 billion in 2025, ending two years of decline, according to the 10th edition of the Art Basel and UBS Global Art Market Report 2026. Authored by Dr Clare McAndrew of Arts Economics, the report underscored what is a modest rise. But in a world of wealth and vanity, dominated for the past few years by the paranoia of uncertainty, the trade will take modesty any day. 

And the fairs are pulling their weight. Art fairs now account for 35% of dealer sales, the highest share since 2022. Collectors, as it turns out, still like to touch and feel what they are buying, especially when the price tag runs to six figures and above.

The flip side: online art sales fell in 2025 to $9.2 billion, the lowest since 2019. Big-ticket buying has definitively moved back to in-person, and the lockdown habit of acquiring a masterpiece from the comfort of a sofa has quietly lapsed

Back in the impeccably curated halls, a beautiful horse head made me stop in my tracks. But with no price tag attached, your modest, art-curious editor quickly moved on, sighing at the lightweight wallet I tend to lug around

Wandering on, I peered at antique jewellery as one with dreams does

From diamond-encrusted earrings to rare pigeon blood Burmese ruby rings. Antique Cartier watches to a long-lost princess's tiara and a Hermès counter of antiques that would make every fan of the distinctive orange boxes, sweat. The eclectic collection of curios ranged from ancient Asian art to stunning baroque paintings. Roman sculptures that probably adorned a villa; antique armoires that belonged to a duchess long forgotten; desks that kings sat at, all competing with cannons, miniature tanks and even an intricately carved grand piano.

The price tags, if they were visible at all, ranged from a few thousand to millions. 

And that's where the gap in the art market becomes as clear as the Czech spyglass I wish I had the funds to buy.

The big money is flowing to the top of the art funnel. Sales at public auction rose 9% to $20.7 billion, and sales of works above $10 million jumped 30%.

Postwar art at auction is still the biggest fine art category at $3.1 billion, though sales in that segment are down 3%. Decorative art and design tell the same story in miniature: $3.9 billion at auction, up 7%.

What has also become clear is that the bigger bump in the art market comes from fewer pieces moving, and they are ones that need deep pockets.

But the top isn't the only end of the market doing well.

The smallest dealers, those selling less than $500,000 a year, grew sales fastest, but that growth driven by a handful, by selling more pieces to fewer people.

So, who is actually doing the buying?

In a world teetering on uncertain ground with tariff and trade wars and inflation, sales have shifted to local buyers. But the map of where art sells hasn’t changed much.

In 2025, the US remained the largest market with 44% of sales by value, up 1% in share year-on-year, followed by the UK with a stable 18% and China at 14%, down 1%. France, the fourth-largest market and the EU's largest, increased its share by 1% to 8%.

The UK held on to second place in 2025 with sales up 2% to $10.5 billion. Interestingly, that bump was carried by the auction rooms, while dealers had a quieter year. 

Mind the gap

Now to the part worrying the trade: the middle. 

Dealer sales rose 2% to $34.8 billion in 2025, but that average hides a market pulling in two directions.

Dealers turning over less than $500,000 saw double-digit growth. The caveat - for dealers selling between $250,000 and $500,000 a year, higher sales didn’t mean higher profits: almost half said their margins shrank.

Those above $10 million returned to 3% growth after two years of decline.

Squeezed in between, dealers turning over $1 million to $10 million slipped 1%. Not small enough to be nimble, not big enough to ride the top-end wave.

Costs make the squeeze on the middle worse. Operating costs rose 5%, outpacing inflation and sales, led by shipping and logistics and art fairs. In response, some dealers have shrunk to survive, and others no longer even have galleries.

Closer to home, UK dealers reported a third straight year of falling turnover, down 1%. 

So where is the middle finding its buyers? In the tent. Fairs made up 35% of dealer sales, the highest share since 2022, and mid-sized dealers leaned in hardest: 36% of their sales now come from fairs, up from 29%.

Which is rather the point of a week in Berkeley Square.

Where are the women?

Art Basel's report shows another gap, and it too widens the higher up the market you go. Female artist representation strengthened in 2025, reaching parity among primary market galleries and 45% across all dealers. That is up from 41% in 2024 and 35% in 2018. 

Works by female artists accounted for 37% of sales by value, compared with 28% in 2018. For primary market galleries, their share was an impressive 44%. 

But despite this progress, the disparity in career progression is clear. Women account for 55% of artists and 43% of sales among dealers with turnover below $250,000. Compare that to 35% of artists and only 27% of sales at galleries with revenues above $10 million.

The irony writes itself. The bigger the gallery is, the fewer the women represented. 

Clouds and LAPADA's silver lining

The cloud on the horizon is trade itself, in a business whose foundation is built on objects crossing borders. While fine art is largely exempt from US import surcharges, uncertainty reigns. Ancillary materials 'could be' subjected to tariffs, while antique furniture now require a mountain of paperwork in the US to be duty free. Decorative arts pay in full as do imports from certain countries. That is not a throwaway footnote for the wheelers and dealers at an antiques fair like LAPADA. 

Add on another persistent cloud of rising operating costs - inflation, skyrocketing shipping costs and brokerage fees. 

Yet 43% of dealers expect sales to rise in 2026.

The art world has firmly decided to look for its silver lining, and it is finding it in those who choose to spend in person, on the highest-ticket items.

As the middle tries to close the gap, in an interview with UBS, Dr McAndrew offered advice dealers might take to heart:

““There are so many price points in the art market. And so many really high-quality works at different price points and in different mediums that it is a very accessible market. And that is what's really going to drive its future growth - welcoming more people at different price levels.””

— Dr Clare McAndrew, Arts Economics

In the meantime, if you are in London or planning a visit by 1 November, drop into LAPADA Berkeley Square Fair. Nothing makes you take note of the history of the ups and downs of our world more than the objects that will survive into our future - even as they raise the cortisol levels of the dealers in charge of finding them their next home.