PHILADELPHIA, PENN. — Pennsylvania artisans highlighted Freeman’s design sale this week, with record-breaking work from Mira Nakashima among others. The first of Freeman’s bi-annual Twentieth Century design auctions featured works from the collection of Perry & June Ottenberg, and totaled more than $875,000, with a 91 percent sell-through rate and 93 percent sold by value.

Freeman’s set a worldwide auction record for any work made by Mira Nakashima (under her sole direction or in conjunction with her father, George Nakashima), with the sale of a Holtz dining table and set of eight Conoid chairs. The set came from the collection of Dr Steven J. Weber and Pati Doyle-Weber, early patrons of Mira Nakashima’s following the death of Mira’s father in 1990. The extraordinarily large and impressive table has a single board Claro walnut top with eight butterflies in American black walnut and laurel and the exposed cross-section of a lead bullet revealed during the sawing of the lumber. When auctioneer Tim Andreadis, who also serves as the head of Twentieth Century design, struck the hammer, the lot had soared past its presale estimate of $60/80,000, selling for $150,000 and setting a world record for the artist.

Watch for a full review of the sale to follow.