EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND – An important work by Charles Rennie Mackintosh (1868-1928) made a sensational $325,000 in Lyon & Turnbull’s live online “Decorative Arts: Design since 1860” sale November 2-3. The bedside cabinet, the pair to another in the collection of the Victoria & Albert Museum, proved the star lot in the sale.

Last sold at auction in 1988, the piece was made around 1916 for the industrialist Wenman Joseph Bassett Lowke (1877-1953) whose house 78 Derngate, Northampton, was remodeled and furnished in the modern taste. In the wake of his success in Glasgow, Mackintosh and his wife Margaret Macdonald had moved to Suffolk in 1914 with Bassett Lowke, founder of the tinplate toy maker of the same name, becoming his main client. At 78 Derngate, Mackintosh’s style evolved to focus on broad planes of polished and waxed timber enhanced by abalone inlay. His production methods changed too. Unable to supervise the manufacture of these pieces, Mackintosh provided drawings that were worked up by German craftspeople working on the Isle of Man.

The cabinet had an estimate of $13/19,500 and attracted bidders from around the world, eventually selling to a private British collector bidding on the phone and underbid by a bidder on Lyon & Turnbull Live, the firm’s online platform.

Prices have been converted from pounds and include the buyers’ premium. For information, www.lyonandturnbull.com.