Irita Marriott is an exciting on-screen antiques dealer and auctioneer. She has a particular passion for porcelain items and you will often find her at antiques shows around the UK as well as her regular appearances on BBC1’s Antiques Road Trip, Celebrity Antiques Road Trip, Bargain Hunt and fronting her own series on Really TV entitled The Derbyshire Auction House.
Irita Marriott discovered her passion for antiques – and a desire for a career in the antiques industry – when she moved to Derbyshire with her husband. To help get a fuller understanding of the business, she took a part-time job at a leading Derbyshire auction house as a salesroom assistant, where she had the opportunity to work with a huge variety of antiques and learn on the job.
Irita stayed at the auction house for 7 years, becoming a cataloguer and valuer whilst dealing antiques independently on the side. She started with car boot sales and small antique fairs, but rapidly expanded into international fairs and founded Irita Marriott Antiques. In 2023 she set up her own auction house, Irita Marriott Auctioneers in Derbyshire.
As a full-time antiques dealer, Irita specialises in decorative antiques, often sourced from frequent buying trips to the continent. Irita considers herself a new-generation dealer and is proud to say she has customers worldwide.
In 2023, Irita Marriott opened Auctioneers and Valuers – one of very few female led auction houses in UK.
Irita Marriott’s expertise has shone on a variety of antiques programs. She is best known for her work on BBC One’s Antiques Road Trip, Celebrity Antiques Road Trip and Bargain Hunt. She has also appeared on Channel 4’s The Greatest Auction.
Most recently Irita can be seen fronting her own series on Really TV entitled The Derbyshire Auction House, in which she helps people uncover potential treasures in their homes to auction at her own auction house business, Irita Marriott Auctioneers and Valuers Limited.
Irita’s aim is to encourage others to try their hand at antique dealing and follow her footsteps into this exciting area of business.
Irita was born in Latvia in 1984. Her early years were very humble and far from plain sailing. She lived on a country farm that was fully self-sufficient with her numerous siblings until she was 6 years old.
At school, she wouldn’t describe herself as studious and she remembers an English teacher saying to her, “You will be a no one! You won’t make it in life without English”.
So, she applied for an au pair job in the US and set off to New York with barely any English language knowledge at all – just an English dictionary in hand. Being thrown in the deep end worked and 3 months later she could speak english and understand everyone around her.
After two years in the US, Irita decided to visit her family back in Latvia, planning to return to the US straight after – but life had other plans. One thing led to another, and she ended up on a bus to the UK. She was just 20 years old and has never looked back. Her first job was as a temporary Christmas worker in a garden centre where she soon worked her way up to run the department. She also became a buyer, which has come in handy in her current work as a dealer.
Today, Irita lives in Derbyshire with her husband and two lovely sons.
