Music producer to the stars is auctioning studio door with smoking teddy bear artwork stored in his garden shed in Derbyshire

Jonathan Rowlands’ latest offering to the market is an old studio door that was painted by a former member of Ian Dury’s band Kilburn and the High Roads more than 40 years ago.

The artist who painted the door is Humphrey Ocean, now a respected member of the Royal Academy of Arts whose paintings sell for upwards of £14,000.

Jonathan, 84, said: “Years ago I had a basement studio in Chelsea in London which was down the end of a long alleyway and people couldn’t find the door. I had a logo of a smoking teddy bear with a briefcase and asked Ian Dury if he knew of anyone who could paint it on my door. Ian had been an art teacher in Lewisham and one of his students was Humphrey who came along, took my illustration and painted it on the door. His initials HO are on the lock of the teddy’s briefcase.

"The door knob is in the wrong place, but it’s the correct place for the door,” said Jonathan, referring to its placement in the groin area of the artwork.

When the studio lease expired, Jonathan packed up the door and put a new one in its place. He said: “I thought that I would open a new studio and use that door but it stood in the corner of various warehouses and in the end my garden shed in Bakewell for 40 years. When I ripped the packaging off last year, my wife said it would be good for the Antiques Roadshow. We wrote to the BBC and got a reply saying they would love to value it so we took it to Wollaton Hall where they were filming. A friend of mine offered me £2,000, which was what it was valued at, but I said no, we’ll put it in a sale.”

The door, which has a pre-auction estimate of £1,000 to £1,500, will go under the hammer at Cheffins in Cambridge on October 26.

It’s the same auction house that sold a highly collectible tape recording for him earlier this year. Jonathan a former manager of Rod Steward, had the singer’s first studio recording which helped land his original record deal in 1964. The analogue tape raised triple its estimated value when it sold for £3,400.

Jonathan said: “Another thing I’m going to sell is a piece of celluloid film with Tom Jones, Paul Jones and Brian Jones all together which no-one else has got. With the cost of living, you have to garner while you can.”

During his fascinating career Jonathan managed American singer RB Greaves with whom he wrote the hit song Take A Letter Maria. The record went to number two in 1969 and stayed in the Billboard charts in the United States for 15 weeks, selling a million copies. By 1970, sales of the record had rocketed to 2.5million.

Jonathan is writing a book based on his 60 years of showbusiness. He said: “Having been out there promoting Tom Jones, Englebert Humperdinck, Nancy Wilson, Nina Simone and having had a hit in America, people seem quite interested in hearing my little jolly adventures.”