The old joke is you find gentlemen trying to be auctioneers at Christie’s; at Sotheby’s it’s the other way round. So you may be surprised Sotheby’s, 1744, is the senior; Christie’s is an upstart founded in 1766.
They are the two best known auction houses in London and perhaps Europe and North America. Indeed both lavished hospitality on me as a potential seller years ago. In fact I was a small-time buyer. But there are loads of local auction houses and my local is Lots Road Auctions, founded in 1979. Over the years, mostly in connection with renting two small weekend getaways in the country, I have been both buyer and seller – all many years before this website started. Recently I have turned buyer again.
As part of a reorganisation of my books, I have put the James Lees-Milne diaries and books – ditto Patrick Leigh Fermor, on the top shelf. They are out of reach so I made a small purchase to solve this First World problem. Also I have hardbacks too big for most of my shelves so needed a small bookcase with shelves for big books. Here is what I have sourced at Lots Road – what an appropriate name for a street with an auction house. I could have bought similar at IKEA but repro brown furniture suits me better.
It’s a work in progress. An extensive collection of William Boyd hardbacks are going upstairs passing diaries, memoirs and biographies relating to the mid 20th century on the way down. It’s not entirely logical but usually I can find a book I’m hunting for and that’s what matters.
Of course it doesn’t matter but at the end of lunch today I asked my guest if she’d like a glass of Sauternes or similar. Perhaps I was rude but I steered her away from the fairly priced, old dY’Quem at £72.50 – that’s for a glass. She went for a Barsac, but I told her it’s a Sauternes, Château Doisy-Daëne. It was so good that I joined her and gained courage to terminate my seances with Wine to Water. I have six unused hours I can use for up to a year and then they will subsidise those more addicted and poorer than me. As Wine to Water is quite scary I, additionally, needed two snifters of Cardinal Mendoza to give me courage.
No room for new purchases?
Where did Chips land? Hope he made the cut.
Oh dear! My picture is a bit blurry but three vols of Chips are on top shelf, left, of the new bookcase. Irrelevantly, all William Boyd, Conan Doyle and Tony Scotland books are now in my bedroom.
Good investment in furniture , although white furniture & white fittings are the rage these days .
As f sauternes it might be better to keep the case unopened for a few years before selling the lot up f auction . It would be more of an investment . I did that with 2 cases of port (Graham 1957 ) belonging to me betw 1959 & 1997 .