Top lot in the sale, these eight plates of Basilius Besler (1561-1629) botanical engravings soared from their $1/1,500 estimate to capture $25,600.
Review by W.A. Demers, Photos Courtesy Stair Galleries
HUDSON, N.Y. — Before fashion designer Tommy Hilfiger and Susie Hilfiger, his wife of 20 years, called it quits, they shared the country house Denbigh Farm in Greenwich, Conn. The collection of Susie Hilfiger represented the family’s life-long interests and connoisseurship. Furnished and decorated by Susie Hilfiger, Denbigh Farm was her residence for more than 25 years Her interior design prowess and keen collector’s eye added to the property’s storied past by incorporating the comfortable English country furnishings that filled much of the house with French and American decorations and fine art. Stair Galleries two-part sale of the collection of Susie Hilfiger at Denbigh Farm on April 19 and 20 totaled $1,462,158 and posted a sell-through rate of 98 percent, thanks to enthusiastic bidders numbering 875. “We were very pleased with the sale,” said Muffie Cunningham, Stair’s director of decorative arts. “There were literally five lots left over.”
The sale was led by eight plates of Basilius Besler (1561-1629) botanicals engravings, which soared from their $1/1,500 estimate to capture $25,600. The engravings in black on laid paper with text on the reverse were all 19 by 15-3/5 inches. “They weren’t painted. They were in their original condition, which is rare, and to find a good large set, so it was wonderful that they made what they made,” said Cunningham.
There were three treasures that each brought $19,200, two on the first day and one on the second. On Day 1, it was a Dodie Thayer porcelain cabbage form tureen, cover and underplate and a Ziegler Mahal carpet from Central Persia. Thayer, a self-taught artist and potter from Florida, is a darling of the celebrity circuit with her line of lettuce ware, which is handcrafted dinnerware, serverware, etc., in realistic vegetable form ceramics. “Everybody in Palm Beach has Dodie Thayer,” observed Cunningham. Known as the “Pottery Queen of Palm Beach,” Thayer began her hobby in the 1960s, teaching herself how to mold clay from lettuce and cabbage leaves. She made each piece of her lettuce ware in all of its green ruffled glory by hand in her home workshop. A Thayer lettuce ware set of 307 pieces, including plates, platters, tureens, bowls, candlesticks and teapots that belonged to the Sinatras, sold at Sotheby’s in 2018 for $37,500. This sale’s tureen, eclipsing its $1,5/3,000 estimate, bore an incised mark, dated ’88, 10 by 16 inches in diameter. “It’s a large one,” said Cunningham, “and they don’t often come in that scale.” The carpet measured approximately 19 feet 4 inches by 14 feet 9 inches. “Circa 1880 and in really good condition, it had very strong colors and that really helped. The size was accommodating, and I’m glad that did well.”
This giltwood figure of an eagle on a mahogany pedestal stood 6 feet 3½ inches high. It tripled its high estimate to finish at $15,360.
People, observed Cunningham, are still interested in traditional material given the right circumstances. Thus, the third lot to bring $19,200, offered on the second day, was a pair of small George III giltwood mirrors. They also surpassed their presale expectation, valued at $2/4,000.
A giltwood figure of an eagle on a mahogany pedestal tripled its high estimate to finish at $15,360. It was large at 35½ by 29 by 13 inches and its pedestal was 39½ by 12½ by 12½ inches. Overall, the winged figure stood 6 feet 3½ inches high.
Furniture in the sale was mostly English and classical in form. The highest price was attained by a pair of George III mahogany serpentine front chests of drawers, attributed to Gillows, which ignored a $4/6,000 estimate as they were bid to $15,360. Each measured 33¾ by 42¼ by 21½ inches. Fetching $14,080 was a set of 10 George III mahogany ladder back dining chairs together with two side chairs of later date. Armchairs were 38 by 22¾ by 22½ inches, while side chairs were 36¾ by 21¾ by 17½ inches.
Large Persian Mahal carpet, approximately 26 feet 6 inches by 13 feet 6 inches, made $13,440.
A Regency mahogany three-pedestal extension dining table leaving the gallery at $10,880 was 28½ by 13 feet 9 inches by 5 feet 2½ inches, fully extended, and had Devenish Antiques, NYC, provenance.
A Regency brass-mounted mahogany center table, 29 inches high by 5 feet in diameter, romantically photographed in the catalog heaped with books, jumped its $2/4,000 estimate to land at $14,080.
Speaking of books, somebody liked a nine-volume set of Charles Dickens’s Works, taking it to $12,800, 10 ten times its high estimate. The 1881-82 Dombey & Son from the Edition de Luxe, contained two volumes with Sketches by Boz together with Dickens’s Works: Ten Volumes, 1894, number 2 of 500 copies.
Additional furniture highlights included a pretty-in-pink Regence-style gilt-bronze mounted pink lacquer and parcel-gilt commode. Fitted with a painted faux marble top, it earned $10,880, more than twice high estimate.
Fetching $8,960, more than double its high estimate, was a four-poster bamboo and printed cotton canopy bed.
And sweet dreams were in store for the winning bidder of a four-poster bamboo and printed cotton canopy bed that also more than doubled its high estimate, realizing $8,960. Approximately 6 feet 9 inches by 5 feet 6½ by 7 feet 2 inches, it would require a mattress size of 6 feet 8 inches by 5 feet 4 inches.
In the category of fine and decorative arts, an unsigned English School oil on canvas painting of a peacock, turkey, rabbit and chick all perambulating together, 40 by 50 inches, brought $15,360, while a George Earl (1824-1908) portrait of a Laverack setter, a breed developed with the help of Llewellin and Edward Laverack, crossed the block at $10,880. If the Earl name is familiar, catalog notes point out that George Earl was an avid sportsman and sporting painter. His daughter, the talented dog painter Maud Earl, was his student and went on to surpass him in notoriety in the Victorian era.
Finally, selling for triple its high estimate at $10,240 was a white glazed ceramic rabbit tureen and cover by French postwar and contemporary ceramic artist Jean-Paul Gourdon (b 1956). With incised mark, no. 11/100, the tureen measured 19½ by 22 by 8¼ inches.
Prices given include the buyer’s premium as stated by the auction house. Stair’s next auctions are May 17: Chalet Espérance: The Collection of Jill and John Fairchild, Gstaad; and May 18: The Fine Sale. For information. www.stairgalleries.com or 518-751-1000.
