1984, awarded a grant for Research in Design History from the Guild of St George to investigate the relationship between Greek painted pottery and precious metalwork, and studied relevant material in the Hermitage Museum, at Châtillon-sur-Seine and in Paris. (This work resulted in M. Vickers and D.W.J. Gill, Artful Crafts: Ancient Greek Silverware and Pottery [Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1994]).
1986, visited Bulgaria under the British Council Cultural Exchange scheme to study the rich holdings of precious metalwork in Bulgarian museums.