Everyone urged to check if they have IKEA furniture that could be worth £15,000

People are being urged to check if they have certain pieces of IKEA furniture at home, because they could be worth £15,000. Even if you don't think you have anything from IKEA in your home, it's well worth looking when you consider the price they're now worth.

These days, IKEA armchairs typically cost around £100 to £200. But if you have one from a different decade, it may be worth tens of thousands.

An Ikea armchair that sold for £20 in 1959 recently reached a staggering £15,500 when sold at auction .The Bengt Ruda Cavelli armchair set the record for the most expensive piece of Ikea furniture ever when it was auctioned off.

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The chair is striking, but also rare, with just five ever made. Pontus Silfverstolpe, antiques expert and founder of Barnebys antiques website, said: "The flat package fortune continues to surprise the auction world, but we have more peaks to look forward to.

"It is especially designer furniture from the 1950s and 1980s from Ikea that costs more and more on the second-hand market."

The furniture that is most attractive to collectors and design enthusiasts is an innovative design for its time, made of good materials and in a limited edition or manufacturing period. Ironically the most expensive Ikea auction items today are almost always Ikea's flops, which were quickly discontinued due to lack of sales figures or expensive production costs, says Pontus Silfverstolpe. Among other valuable early designs of the Ikea furniture range sold at auction is the furniture group Åke.

Åke was manufactured in 1952-1956 and included sofas and armchairs. In 1956 an Åke armchair cost just £8, but just over fifty years later, its price is