LONDON.- Christie’s announces The Collector: Online, open for browsing and bidding from 27 October until the 17 November, and The Collector: Live, taking place at Christie’s King Street, on 12 November. Both auctions represent the finest European and English furniture, works of art, silver, ceramics and gold boxes. Christie’s has collaborated this season with Gianluca Longo, Style Editor of British Vogue and Cabana, who has presented his personal selection of lots from the sale in a pre-auction shoot at Syon House.

Gianluca Longo, has built his reputation through decades of working and consulting in the luxury sector across fashion, travel and interiors, primarily in the creation and production of many high profile international fashion campaigns and magazine location shoots for pre-eminent brands and publications. Gianluca has imagined five rooms within the magnificent surroundings of The Grand Conservatory at the historic and classical Syon House for The Collector, combining lots from both sales. Driven by his vision and aspiration to live much as those travelling at the time of the Grand Tour did, Gianluca chose lots from both The Collector: Live and The Collector: Online sales to create room vignettes.

Tastemaker and international style editor, Gianluca Longo comments, ‘I have always been inspired by nature, travel and art throughout my life and the opportunity to recreate a series of rooms ‘at home’ in the classical surroundings of Syon House, with carte blanche to select my preferred lots across both of The Collector sales, was a way of bringing this to life. It is possible to reimagine these period pieces with a modern touch in today’s home as much as in this grand conservatory’.

Gianluca continues, ‘I imagined moving seamlessly from one ‘room’ to another, its volume filled with nature both inside and out, creating our very own natural wallpaper and fabric in this instance. I do not believe in living with one set style of interiors or one period of works in any home - my personal aesthetic draws me to mix and match. My personal style is very much echoed in my interiors where there is a direct correlation in our lives. I have an 18th century dining table and a 17th century series of panels in my own home, next to a collection of 20th century ceramics, a contemporary sofa and a diverse and eclectic number of brightly coloured and patterned cushions to add modernity. I get enormous pleasure from buying works at auction - I tend to use one item as a statement in a room and build around it’.

‘I aspire to own James Wyatt’s Gothic style George III polychrome-painted fittings from the Library Ante Chamber, Lee Priory, Kent, 1785-90, I can picture spending many happy hours curating my own collection of books, ceramics and works of art in this magnificent piece’.




Gianluca Longo comments, ‘I have always taken great pleasure in dressing a table whether for myself or entertaining others. I believe that dining should be an experience. I am an obsessive collector of fine vintage silverware, vintage china and Italian crystal glass wear which I mix and match according to a colour theme or my mood. At home, as in life, changing one’s surroundings and adding colour and pattern, as I have done in the Dining Room, adds a further sensory dimension and makes for a more pleasurable environment’

Isabelle Cartier-Stone, Head of Sale, and Specialist Silver and Gold Boxes, observes, ‘The collaboration with Gianluca Longo at Syon House is a reminder that nature has always been a prime source of inspiration for craftsmen creating some of the most admired styles and ornaments. Today, more than ever we crave closeness with nature and aspire to bring it into our homes to create a harmonious and balanced environment’.

The Collector: Live sale comprises 299 lots which showcase works selected for their distinctive quality, superior provenance and discerning craftsmanship. It includes the very best of European decorative arts, drawing together a myriad of styles from the high Rococo of Louis XVI, to the English Regency and into the historicism and revivals of the late 19th century.

The Collector: Online comprises 185 lots covering all aspects of the decorative arts from around the world including works from France, Italy, Germany, Japan, England, dating from the 17th to the 20th century.

Estimates for The Collector: Live range from £1,500 - £100,000. The Collector: Live exhibition and viewing will take place at Christie’s King Street, from 7 – 11 November along with highlights on view from The Collector: Online sale. Estimates for The Collector: Online sale range from £600- £25,000.

The Collector live auction is being held at Christie’s King Street on 12 November under socially distanced guidelines and in adherence of current government regulations