http://film.guardian.co.uk/news/story/0,,1730682,00.html

Staff and agencies
Tuesday March 14, 2006

Guardian Unlimited



Wallace and Gromit may have picked up their fourth Oscar but it seems the cheese-loving inventor and his canine sidekick are worth just £6,000.
Last year, flames raged through a Bristol warehouse where countless props from Aardman Animations' films, such as the Wallace and Gromit series and 2000's Chicken Run, were stored. The fire also destroyed original models of Wallace and Gromit, as well as the talking polar bears, terrapins and jaguar from Creature Comforts.

Now Norwich Union has finally paid out more than £500,000 in insurance costs for the destroyed objects. But there doesn't seem to be any Wallace and Gromit fans at the firm: Wallace is estimated to be worth just £4,000 while Gromit is worth £2,000. This is significantly less than the Pie Machine from Chicken Run, which was estimated to be worth £100,000.

Most of Aardman's pioneering past in British animation, including original sketches and storyboards, was destroyed in the blaze last October. Aardman spokesman Arthur Sheriff said at the time of the blaze: "Everything from Morph to Creature Comforts to Wallace and Gromit was there. It had all the film sets, the props, the models, everything. It really is a bit of tragedy.

Aardman Animations' Nick Park and Steve Box picked up the Oscar for best animated feature for their recent claymation adventure Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit at the Los Angeles ceremony in March. Earlier this year the film topped the worldwide box office for three weeks in a row earning over '108m (£60m) in total.

Must be.

Awwww W&G are worth way more than that, the price quoted is low because there are lots of W&G models in existence which have been made for the films or exhibitions over the past 2 decades. I can imagine the originals are insured for a lot more than that.

do aardman still have a good collection of models/sets/props etc after the fire in 2005?

I agree with Katie, it much be more worth more than that, they made a feature-film for crackers-sake, oh well!.