Visiting the Tate's 1984 Pre-Raphaelite exhibition was a life-changing moment, he said. "It galvanised my collecting. The whole exhibition struck me … the poetry, the storylines, the romanticism. As a businessman who didn't have any formal training, it … caused me to suddenly pick up books and feverishly read [about] what inspired the artists."

His fascination was further boosted by a visit to Leighton House, the exotic former home and studio of the Victorian artist Lord Frederic Leighton. Schaeffer said: "Of all the Victorian artists, I found him to be the king on the top of the mountain."

Yet in the 1950s and 1960s, at a time when high Victorian art was deeply unfashionable for collectors, British public collections sold off masterpieces that would today be worth millions. By the time Schaeffer began collecting in the 1980s, they had begun "scaling up in price". Even so, paintings that he could then buy for £100,000 would now cost a million, he said.