August 19th, 2012
It was just 9 months ago, that an unsigned Lalique Renard Hood Ornament appeared in the Pennsylvania countryside and made a world record price for any Rene Lalique Car Mascot at auction of $204,750. High prices and hounds are apparently the two things that can flush out a fox, and a signed example in apparent good order dutifully appeared in the sale announcement for the annual sale of automobiles and related items that Bonhams holds in Carmel California, timed around the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance Car Show held each year.
Bonhams usually offers up a good supply of R. Lalique Mascots at this auction, and accompanying the Renard for the August 16th sale were about 20 other Rene Lalique Mascots as well as two brass copies of Rene Lalique Paperweights and Person Majestic copies of the Longchamp and Victoire Car Mascots.
 High seller was the great Renard as Lot 230 making $338,500 including the buyers premium, and topping the previous record by just about 65%. This example had the block letter signature on the side of the base, a little bit of scuffing, and was said by Bonhams to have great mold definition.
Note that we are reliably informed that this price fell just short of the highest price ever paid at auction for ANY car mascot of any manufacture. That record is said to be held by a Bugatti Royale silver plated standing Elephant mascot that made £205,000 in 2010.
Selling just before the Renard and making a likely World Record price of its own was Lot 228 the horse head Epsom Car Mascot which made $68,500 all-in against a conservative pre-sale estimate. Third place in price department went to a striking blue peacock head Tete De Paon Mascot, one of a pair that surfaced several months back, the first one of which was also sold by Bonhams earlier this year. This example made $43,750 all-in, outselling the first of the pair which had made a premium inclusive $40,000 in April.
Looking at price strength across the board, you might skip over the good all-in prices paid for the small dragonfly Petite Libellule Mascot ($17,500), the greyhound Levrier Mascot ($8,750), the guinea fowl La Pintade ($15,000), the frog Grenouille Mascot ($23,750) and even the ram’s head Tete De Belier ($12,500) and go straight to the usually more price restrained Lot 223 swallow Hirondelle Car Mascot, which made a strong $9,375 affixed to a custom base.
 Overall, a pretty good run of results for the great Lalique Hood Ornaments ranging form the somewhat common to the extremely rare.
One more general comment about the Renard. It has become commonplace for folks to talk about there being only 5 or 6 or a “a small handful” of these fox hood ornaments in existence. And Bonhams had a catalogue note concerning the Renard to this effect. However, this writer would steer you to double digits, and whether that’s likely 20 or 30 or whatever is a discussion that will have to be left for another day. But take note that 3 have appeared at auction in the past nine months alone, the third being part of the complete Lalique Car Mascot Collection sold in Florida in March 2012.
In the meantime, check our Rene Lalique Car Mascots page here at RLalique.com. It has photos of each mascot in a catalogue format, and links to individual pages of photos and information for each Lalique mascot model.
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August 13th, 2012
The R. Lalique Espalion Vase is a one of the great Rene Lalique Vase models from the art deco era. First introduced in 1927 during the most roaring of the roaring 20’s, this was a vase that held true to the roots of Rene Lalique design. The vase was uniquely shaped, had a fern leaf motif all-over the exterior, and small rim opening more suitable for the shorter and smaller daily flowers of the day. It was an extremely attractive decorative object in its own right even if never used as a flower holder. The popular model was sold on several continents by Rene Lalique et Cie retailers and they have found their way all over the world in the 85 years since their introduction. The Espalions are typically seen in opalescent or just clear and frosted, but sometimes in a great blue glass as well as the amazing cased opalescent green shown in the accompanying photo.
As with so much other R.Lalique, the vase that is the subject of this article found its way to the American heartland. Owned by the wealthy Kellogg Family in Minnesota*, it journeyed by gift and then inheritance to another R.Lalique rich U.S. state: Oklahoma.
Out it came at the Tulsa stop of the Antiques Roadshow in an episode that first aired in January of 2012. The appraiser, David McCarron, has over 1/4 century of experience in decorative arts including stints as both auctioneer and appraiser. Currently based in Massachusetts, he has worked for a variety of firms including Sotheby’s and Freemans, has even appeared on Oprah (doubtful that he jumped up and down on the Oprah couch to proclaim his love for decorative arts**), and has been with the Antiques Roadshow since its 1997 inception. His take on the great Lalique Blue Glass Espalion Vase can be seen HERE.
We don’t know for sure, but we’re thinking there’s a good chance David is a follower of the RLalique.com website! Here is part of what our Rene Lalique Biography says in the introduction to Rene Lalique:
“In 1900 at the age of 40, he was the most celebrated jeweler in the world and an art nouveau artist and designer of magnificent proportions. But by 1925 at the height of the art deco era he was the most celebrated glassmaker in the world.” Amen.
* This Espalion is not the only blue glass R.Lalique vase attributed to the Minnesota Kellogg Family. This writer acquired a wonderful blue glass R. Lalique Borromee Vase from the same Minneapolis family.
** The actor Tom Cruise weirdly jumped up and down on the Oprah Show couch in 2005 to proclaim his love for the now latest of his several ex-wives.
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June 1st, 2012
“Close but no cigar” is an American expression that likely originated at carnivals where cigars were given away as prizes at the various games of chance. Some early slot machines also awarded cigars to winners and may have contributed to the spread of this expression
 Well, at Christie’s South Kensington’s Semi-Annual Lalique Sale, the high seller was Lot 143, a nice looking electric blue glass R. Lalique Poissons Vase. Against an estimate of £30,000 to £50,000 or about $48,000 to $80,000 (at the estimated 1.6 U.S. dollars to a British pound used throughout this article), the vase made £65,000/$104,000, and with the buyers premium, an all-in total of £79,250/$126,800.
A record price at auction for a Lalique Poissons Vase! A record price at auction for a Lalique blue glass vase! But the total price (which does not include possible other charges) was just shy of what they might call in the American Southwest, the Big Enchilada; the record high price at auction for a colored glass Lalique production vase. Not quite the turkey** we were hoping but a great Rene Lalique result nonetheless.
 This is of course only minor consolation for the buyer who if rumor is correct, hailed from across the channel, and may therefore be responsible for as much as $10,000 to $13,000 or so of added charges related to either VAT or Import Duties or both, which when combined with the reported result, would make for a record payment if not a record price:). Basically, send the cigar ….. and the turkey.
Notably, two other R. Lalique Poissons Vases were offered up as Lots 124 and 142, with the prior, an amber glass example making all-in (as are all further prices in this article unless stated otherwise) £32,450/$51,920, and the later cased red glass example hitting a bit more at £34,850/$55,760. Though less than half the high selling Poissons Vase price, these represented the 3rd and 4th high selling lots in the auction. Nothing fishy here. Notably the result for Lot 142 was roughly equal to the record price at auction for a Red Poissons Vase achieved just last month.
 2nd high seller was another colored glass vase, Lot 141, a Perruches Vase in amber glass that sold for £36,050/$57,680.
And rounding out the top five was a nice looking press molded opalescent glass Bacchantes Vase selling as Lot 125 for £30,000/$48,000.
Some lots (among others) which seemed to make seriously strong and likely record prices include Lot 140, the cased opalescent Perruches Vase at £30,000/$48,000, the cased opalescent Alicante Vase Lot 126 at £25,000/$40,000, and the Muguet Bowl in opalescent glass as Lot 32 for £6,875/$11,000.
 All in all, for Christie’s a sale total of £591,050/$945,580 for 105 sold lots or an average of about £5,629/9,006 of which the R. Lalique glass was 90 lots making £564,524/$903,210 or an average for each Rene Lalique item of about £6,272/$10,036. See all the results here.
If you are interested in more information about Lalique Auctions visit the Rene Lalique Biography Lalique Auctions section from which you can access all the great auction resources here at the Worldwide Gathering Place for Everything R.Lalique!
** Turkey: In American bowling three strikes in a row were called a “triple”. But around the turn of 20th Century, at a time when the game was more difficult, a tradition arose where a player making three strikes in row on Thanksgiving Day or Christmas Day would get a live turkey as a prize. Today, no live turkey, but the appellation has stuck and is now colloquially used to describe almost any three successes in row, bowling or otherwise.
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May 19th, 2012
In 1911, former Kentucky and Missouri schoolteacher Mary McAfee Atkins died at the age of 75. When her husband died 25 years earlier in 1886, he had left here about $250,000, which by the time of her death had become $1,000,000 (this at a time when $1,000,000 was a lot of money of course).
 She left $300,000 in her will to her adopted home town “… for the purchase of necessary ground in Kansas City, Missouri, and the creation of a building to be maintained and used as a Museum of Fine Arts for the use and benefit of the public.”
One notable event during the period when Mrs. Atkins was a widow, and just a country mile from her Kansas City, Missouri home, was the 1904 Louisiana Purchase Exposition in St. Louis Missouri. A major World’s Fair (how could it be a World’s Fair and not be major is a good question), it was attended by the likes of Teddy Roosevelt, Geronimo…yes THE Geronimo, Henri Poincare, T.S. Eliot, Helen Keller, and too many more people and companies to mention. Well except one of course, because Rene Lalique objects were exhibited and sold in St. Louis. And it was there that Henry Walters, the eldest son of William Thompson Walters, a wealthy Baltimore (by way of Liverpool Pennsylvania) liquor trader and railroad man, would see and purchase some great Lalique Jewelry on exhibit at the St. Louis Exposition.
 Walters would die in 1931, leaving his palazzo like art house and contents to the City of Baltimore. It remains today, over 75 years after its opening in 1934, as The Walters Art Museum. And it has about a dozen great pieces of R. Lalique in its 35,000 object collection; a collection that coincidentally contains about the same number of objects as the Museum which is the main point of our story. A story we shall now resume :).
In 1915, four years after the death Mrs. Atkins, William Rockhill Nelson, the man who founded the Kansas City Star Newspaper died. He left the bulk of his large estate in a trust, the income to be used for the purchase of artworks such as paintings, sculptures, books, tapestries, and engravings “…for the delectation** and enjoyment of the public generally.” The estates of a couple other Nelson family members and Mr. Nelson’s lawyer also left additional funds for the same purpose.
 These Atkins and Nelson bequests were unrelated and each estate had its own plans. So it would be some time before events would take their course and these two different bequests would join purpose and coalesce into something tangible for an even greater public good. But coalesce they did, and with trustees for the schoolteacher, the publisher, and the local government working together, in December 1933, at the height of the great depression, on the grounds of Nelson’s former mansion, the new museum was opened to the public. The cost was a striking 2.75 million dollars.
The whole plan started off with land and money, but without much art. But with wildly depressed prices for fantastic artwork due to the depression, the new museum was quickly able to create a world-class collection across many fields.
 Coincidently, the museum architecture was modeled after the classic design of the Cleveland Museum of Art, which recently put on its own World’s Fair Exhibition around the objects of Lalique, Tiffany, and Faberge from the Paris Exposition of 1900.
Fast forwarding in our walk down Midwestern art history lane, in the early part of our new century, the Museum space was expanded for the first time, to nearly 400,000 square feet with the addition of about 165,000 square feet in the new Bloch Building. The Bloch Building was named after the Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Nelson-Atkins Museum, Henry Bloch and his wife Marion; Henry being the H in H & R Bloch.
 And it is at the Nelson-Atkins Museum Of Art in Kansas City Missouri, born of the generous mid-western philanthropic and charitable mindset that is a hallmark of the American character, as part of their amazing and creative exhibition “Inventing the Modern World: Decorative Arts at the World’s Fairs, 1851–1939” that our story comes together.
This exhibition makes the point that all these various World’s Fairs were the embodiment of the then leading design and artistic expression as it stood around the globe. Companies and countries brought their best, and it would be shown in a milieu of the best, newest, most innovative products from dozens of countries and hundreds of companies. These Fairs were more than just big car boot sales looking for buyers. They developed into an expression of the state of art, design, and technology of the day. In the time before routine international travel, before computers and the worldwide web, before the television, and in many cases before cars, planes, telephones, cameras, radios and even electric lights, these Fairs were the place you could go to see what would astound you in a time when the world was a larger, much more unfamiliar, and stranger place.
 It’s only natural that among the makers who would not shy away, but would savor the chance to bring the a-game*** to such a gathering, would be the great Rene Lalique. Be it Paris in 1900 or 1925, St. Louis in 1904, or anywhere else on the globe that the leading artistic endeavors of the day would meet and be compared side by side, Rene Lalique was an anxious participant. And it was that country mile from the schoolteacher and the publisher, a perfect place for the great Lalique to show his goods half a world away from home, that Henry Walters bought, retained, and donated for the public delectation, two of the three pieces of phenomenal Lalique Jewelry that have once again made the trip back to where they first met the American public eye, in Missouri.
And that fortuitous sale back in 1904 could not have occurred in a more apt setting. For Missouri is known throughout America as the “Show Me” state, an expression attributed**** to Missouri Congressman Villard Vandiver who in 1899 is reported to have said in a speech, “I come from a state that raises corn and cotton and cockleburs and Democrats, and frothy eloquence neither convinces nor satisfies me. I am from Missouri. You have got to show me.” Just the place for Rene Lalique.
The Nelson-Atkins Inventing The Modern World Exhibition, bringing in objects from so many World’s Fairs held over nearly 90 years, allows a visitor to see the artistic and technological progression as time moved through the industrial revolution and the age of invention. And it allows viewing each Fair and its objects in the context of the flow of history, not just for design and industry, but culturally as well. Because wrapped up in each object on display is the ability, the talent, the aspirations of the artist, and the state of the industry and the cultures from which they sprang.
 In addition to the wonderful Pansy Brooch and Grape Necklace from The Walters, is the amazing Wasps Stickpin exhibited at the Exposition Universelle de Paris in 1900. This stickpin has been lent by the Design Museum in Copenhagen Denmark. All three objects are stunning in their overall artistic concept, presentation and detail. And all three are trademark Rene Lalique; natural world motifs magnificently executed using materials for what they bring to the artistic nature of the project, and not just creating holders for valuable gems.
Note that each of the three Lalique Jewels is documented in the seminal work Rene Lalique Schmuck und Objets d’art 1890 – 1910 by Sigrid Barten, which is available for purchase in our Library. The Grapes Necklace is Object 346 and can be found on Page 246. The Wasps Stickpin is Object 1400 on Page 478, and the Pansy Brooch is Object 1061 on Pages 414-415.
The Nelson-Atkins is open Wednesdays 10 to 4, Thursdays and Fridays from 10 to 9, Saturdays 10 to 5, and Sundays Noon to 5. You know what we said earlier about the mid-western mindset? Admission is free. While you’re there, you might want to check out the other stuff they have as well :). Visit their website or call them at 816-561-4000 for more information.
The Exhibition will be at the Nelson-Atkins through August 12th, 2012. It will then move to the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh for the period October 13th, 2012 to February 24, 2013. On April 14, 2013 it will open at the New Orleans Museum of Art and remain there until August 4, 2013. It will then move to its final stop at The Mint Museum in Charlotte, North Carolina from September 21, 2013 to January 19th, 2014.
 You can also visit the R.Lalique Jewelry section of the Rene Lalique Biography here at RLalique.com, where you will find links to all the great jewelry resources on the site. And visit the Lalique Museum page for a listing and links to over 80 different museums worldwide that have works of Rene Lalique in their collections. This list includes the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art as their collection contains a great looking black glass Lezards et Bluets Vase and a Sauterelles Vase, The Walters Art Museum, The Design Museum Denmark in Copenhagen, the Carnegie Museum of Art, and the New Orleans Art Museum.
** Delectation means enjoyment or pleasure. So a food that is good might be called delectable, which would be pleasing or delicious. If it’s really good, it could be delectacious, but we’re not sure if that is a real word or not.
*** “a-game” is an American expression which means to bring your best.
**** “show me” as the watchword for Missouri has other claimed origins, none this compelling.
Mrs. Atkins photo from Mr. Denardo.
Three inside photos of the Exhibition by Bob Greenspan.
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May 15th, 2012
 Identify Fake Lalique is a new sub-section of our information packed Lalique Fakes section here at THE Worldwide Gathering Place for R.Lalique Collectors and Enthusiasts.
Through this new sub-section, we’ve made available three different kinds of information on the sources of items that turn up with forged R.Lalique signatures and items just misrepresented as R.Lalique. We estimate that the items accessible from this new sub-section account for as many as 75% of all such items that appear.
First, we have put relevant old catalogues of Czech glass online, and linked to other sites having such catalogues. These catalogues document the source of a great percentage of later forged pieces. Keep in mind that the pieces shown thru the Identify Sources pages were not created with the intent to fool anyone. It is only the later addition of a fake Rene Lalique signature of some kind, or the false representation that the item is the original work of Rene Lalique that makes the piece a fake as far as R.Lalique collectors are concerned. But many of these items have value and are collectible in their own right, and again, were not produced with the intent to deceive anyone.
 Second, we’ve linked to websites that currently sell new pieces that sometimes end up with forged signatures and sold as R.Lalique.
Third, we’ve linked to one general information website (with hopefully more to come) which is helpful in identifying Fake R. Lalique.
We’ve also created an outline on our Authenticating Lalique page, which directs interested owners of possible problem pieces or potential purchasers of any R.Lalique piece, through a four-step process utilizing the resources available here at RLalique.com. The process steps through the resources on Lalique Forgeries, the Modern Lalique Crystal Signatures page, the new Identify Fake R. Lalique sub-section, and finally to the documented R.Lalique Copies that are known to exist.
 We also placed online and accessible from the navigation bar on every page of the main RLalique.com website (all pages except the Blog) a new section on Lalique Signatures! The signature section is broken down into three sub-sections: Authentic Rene Lalique Signatures, Fake R.Lalique Signatures, and the previously mentioned Lalique Crystal Signatures. Actual signatures from actual pieces are shown on all three of these sub-sections. It’s worth keeping in mind that signatures do not authentic pieces as many signatures are easily faked. However, armed with knowledge you can differentiate between modern Lalique Crystal and authentic Rene Lalique signatures. And of course, some signatures are so far off the reservation that being able to spot those saves a lot of time (and possibly money and headaches) as well. Previously the reference literature had but a handful of mainly line drawn signatures for collectors to examine. Now there are hundreds of real examples taken from real pieces. And for the Rene Lalique Signatures and the Cristal Lalique Signatures sub-sections, if you put your cursor over any photo in those two sub-sections, a text window will appear telling you what piece the signature was found on.
 In the future, time permitting as always :), we’ll add over 1000 more photos to the Forgeries section of items that have appeared falsely represented as R. Lalique. And we’ll be breaking the Forgeries section down into more categories to make it faster to look just for the type of piece you have instead of having to scroll thru photos that may show items unrelated to the specific type of item you are researching.
As the value of the great authentic R.Lalique glass and other items continues to appreciate, more and more vigilance is needed to become educated and watchful for the increasing number of fakes entering, or attempting to enter the market. Our Suspicious Lalique Auctions page continues to grow with more and more listings on a continuous basis as fakes and questionable pieces come up for auction in greater numbers. The good news is that this problem is minor for R.Lalique when compared to many collecting fields, some of which have been greatly damaged by the intrusion of fakes and forgeries. But only through information, education, and vigilance by the entire collecting community, can the fakes and forgeries be kept at bay**. This is an effort that benefits everyone involved with the works of Rene Lalique.
 In that regard we are actively soliciting additional sources of information for the new Identify Fakes section; for help in finding and exposing current fakes at auction; in getting information on any other R.Lalique copies that appear; or about ongoing scams as they develop. Also for example, if you have a photo of an R.Lalique signature that we do not show, or of a Cristal Lalique signature we are missing, we would gladly accept help in that area as well. If not for the generous contributions of time and information from many R.Lalique collectors, the information on fakes that we have organized and highlighted here would be just a fraction of its current volume. We have accomplished a lot, but more work remains, and we can use all the help we can get.
 And finally related to this topic, we have a major sub-section where we are assembling photos of known Lalique Crystal Reproductions by the modern Lalique Company of original Rene Lalique designs. This information lets collectors know on which R.Lalique pieces they need to be even more vigilant to ensure they don’t have a modern crystal piece with an altered signature. This sub-section is nearly complete for reproduced vases, but far from complete in other types of items, and we would welcome photos from anyone having pictures of modern crystal reproductions not yet shown on that page.
We are quite hopeful that these latest steps to augment and organize the vast information on Fakes here at RLalique.com will make it easier and faster for potential buyers to get the added information they may need to make better informed decisions about a potential purchase, or for owners to get information about the true nature of a piece they possess.
Oh ya, none of the items pictured in this article are authentic R. Lalique glass.
** “keeping at bay” is an idiomatic expression which means to keep something or someone away from you that might be harmful or unpleasant.
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May 12th, 2012
$100,000 for an R. Lalique Perfume Bottle! How many times have you heard that?
 On March 26th, at the Paris auction house of Olivier Coutau-Bégarie, on offer were about a dozen R.Lalique Perfume Bottles and Boxes. It was a nice selection of perfume bottles and included Le Jade for Roger & Gallet in the well known jade green glass, Fleurs D’Amour, Narkiss and Cigalia for the same perfumer, a nice black Ambre D’Orsay Perfume Bottle, also a clear Ambre bottle, the bottle Camelias, the bottle Le Lys, the perfume bottle Fleurs De France, and the bottle Violette also for D’Orsay, Marjolaine for D’Heraud, Bouquet de Faune for Guerlain, the perfume tester La Renommee again for D’Orsay, and to take the D’Orsay cake, the rare and wonderful Grace Perfume Bottle in original box, which made €17,000 hammer plus 23% buyers charges**, or a total of €20,910 or about $28,000 at the approximate exchange rate of 1.3325 on that day. On most R.Lalique Perfume Bottle days, the great Grace would carry the day in the high price department.
 But on this day, Coutau-Bégarie had one more bottle up their sleeve. Lot 138, estimated below the Grace at €10,000 – €15,000 was a 8.5 centimeters tall soft triangular shaped bottle on low oval base, the bottle ingrained with a light almost ribbed design, topped by a pearl shaped stopper with a contrasting swirl motif on each side. This bottle, previously known to have been produced experimentally but not commercially, is shown in the R. Lalique Catalogue Raisonne on Page 947 under the name Striures (striations) in the section for perfume bottles that may have been produced, but for unknown perfume companies. As we now know from the appearance of this Lot 138, the bottle was used for the perfumer Isabey’s Jasmin scent.
 Isabey was founded in 1924, and the design of this bottle is from 1925. The company was named for an early 19th century artist. Isabey was owned (or financed) by Baron Henri James de Rothschild who was married to Mathilde Sophie Henriette von Weissweiller. Mathilde died at the age of 54 in 1926, while Henri (who was a playwright under the name Andre Pascal) lived thru the end of World War II and died in 1947 at the age of 75. Isabey was acquired in 1941 by Marcel Guerlain.
The rare Jasmin Perfume Bottle with its original box and label crushed the pre-sale estimate making a hammer price of €61,000 and with the 23% listed in the catalogue for buyer’s expenses**, made a total of about €75,000 or approximately $100,000 based on the day’s exchange rate. In a well-stocked sale of around 250 lots, it accounted for 1/3 of the sale total and was obviously the high seller of what was another great day for the great Rene Lalique and his wonderful R.Lalique glass.
If you want to know more about perfume bottles and Rene Lalique, head straight to the R.Lalique Perfume Bottles section of the Lalique Bio here at RLalique.com, where you’ll find information and links to all the resources about Lalique’s great perfume bottles here at THE Worldwide Gathering Place for R.Lalique collectors.
** The buyers charge of 23% in addition to the hammer price) is an estimate.
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April 24th, 2012
 Rene Lalique items continue to get strong prices throughout the world at auction, a good-looking Red Poissons Vase on April 4th in Paris being no exception. Aguttes auction house offered a nice selection of around 15 R. Lalique items at their sale of 20th Century Decorative Arts that day, with the high seller being a Console Table made by Charles Bernel from drawings by Rene Lalique for the Lalique Pavilion at the 1925 Art Deco Exposition In Paris. The rectangular marble table with carved supports made just over €50,000 all in.
 But it’s the next high seller, at €41,628 all-in against a pre-sale estimate of €16,000 – €18,000 that is most interesting in terms of the current market. That price was paid for Lot 67, the patinated red glass Lalique Vase covered with fish. The price for the Poissons Vase translates into about $55,000 which is almost certainly a record price for a Red Poissons at auction. The Lalique signature shown here was inscribed on the vase.
 Third high seller in this same sale was a great looking rare candelabra pair in the model Trois Branches Raisins, selling for €31,627 all-in.
The sale of the good looking R. Lalique Poissons Vase makes yet another mark on the trail of higher and higher prices. We’ve written previously about the demand and pricing for Rene Lalique glass when Lalique buyers see red, but this price strength, fueled by worldwide bidding interest at auctions, is evident across much of the collecting field. Once again, another great result and a great day for the great Rene Lalique.
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April 6th, 2012
 On almost any day of the year, somewhere in the world there is a medal, button, pendant, cufflink, locket, hatpin, or similar object for sale with the mark you see in the first photo here, represented to be the work of Rene Lalique. The hard evidence is the signed “RL” signature. And the soft evidence is the style of the piece, and the likely period of its creation.
But the hard evidence is wrong. The signature is not RL, it’s LR and it’s the mark of Louis Armand Rault, a Frenchman who lived from 1847 to 1903. Rault was a scultpure, a chaser, a jeweler and a medalist. Born the son of a shoemaker in St. Calais in the Pays-de-la-Loire region of northwestern France, by the age of 21 he was working for Boucheron in Paris. The great Henri Vever believed that Rault might have been the most talented chaser of all time! Rault created many unique and attractive objects, a number of which are in major museums.
 But his most often seen works are in a handful of designs that were apparently licensed for use by many different manufacturers. So for example, one of his females in profile designs, may appear in a gilt metal stickpin stamped out in France, or on Sheffield Silver buttons made in England, or on a pendant with the addition of gems around the neck of the female. In addition to sometimes being enhanced with various gems and stones, Rault’s medals also appear inside intricate surrounds or incorporated into other objects such as ashtrays.
 The objects with these designs all have two things in common. They all sport the LR mark shown here. And they all often appear advertised as the work of Rene Lalique. This is true for direct sales ads, online auctions, and at auction houses.
In the very active Fake Lalique section at THE R. Lalique Worldwide Gathering Place, we receive a steady steam of reports from buyers, sellers, and interested parties about the never ending offers of Rault signed LR works improperly attributed as being signed RL for Rene Lalique.
Keep in mind that a false attribution does not always mean purposeful malice by the seller. With that supposed RL mark, a seller may think it’s truly R.Lalique, or maybe it’s just their best guess or wishful thinking. Or maybe the did some research and found the same design attributed to Rene Lalique by other sellers.
 Whatever the seller’s motive or knowledge or lack thereof, the only thing that should concern you as a buyer is to be armed with enough information to dodge these kind of bullets. What the seller knows or doesn’t know is of little import.
We decided that the best way to minimize the continued occurrences of these false claims was to create a Louis Rault reference page that can be easily found by owners and potential buyers of these Rault items who are looking for information and photos to identify these signed LR pieces. And so has been born the LR-RL Signature-Mark confusion page. Check it out.
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March 15th, 2012
 A complete collection of the 30 Lalique Mascots *** sold at RM Auctions on March 10th for $700,000 plus a buyer’s premium of 15% or $105,000 for a total sale price for the great Lalique Glass Collection of $805,000. In addition to the mascots, Lot 111 at the auction also included two custom made cabinets specially configured to display the collection. The lot was offered without reserve as part of the regular Amelia Island Florida collector cars auction put on by RM Auctions.
The appearance at auction and the history of this particular Lalique Collection are discussed in a previous news article at Lalique Mascots!
 At an auction of over 100 high end collector cars, Rene Lalique managed to outsell all but 8 of the other lots in the auction, including squeaking by the 10th highest seller, Lot 168, a great looking Duesenberg Model J Convertible Berline by LeBaron with a storied and detailed provenance dating back to its original owner. It was truly a “Doozie” **** and it made just $2000 less than the Lalique, coming all-in at $803,000.
The stunning wrap up: What Rene Lalique created in glass as artful accessories, have now become more valuable than many of the very autos that his mascots were intended to accessorize! 🙂
You can find links to all of the mascot resources here at THE Worldwide Gathering Place for R.Lalique Enthusiasts by visiting the Lalique Car Mascots section of the Rene Lalique Biography.
*** 30 mascots is considered a complete collection. See the linked article above, as well as the linked Mascot section of the Rene Lalique Bio for details.
**** “It’s a doozie!” is a roughly 100 year old expression of debated origin. However, after the appearance of the Duesenberg Automobiles, it’s use and meaning to designate anything remarkable, one of kind, or the unusual, was cemented into the American lexicon as the phrase became associated with the great motorcars. Today it’s sometimes spelled Duesy, Doosy and Doozy in addition to the spelling we use here.
Photos: Michael Furman courtesy of RM Auctions
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February 23rd, 2012
Rene Lalique Car Mascots are among the glass maker’s most sought after artful objects.
 It all started in 1925 with several mascots including the R. Lalique Cinq Chevaux Car Mascot, a mascot you can read a little bit about in the linked Blog article, and it ended just 6 years later as the spreading global depression changed the buying habits of both decorative glass and automobile buyers.
Lalique mascot collectors today that are attempting to assemble a complete collection, generally try to acquire 30 items, to include the Naiade paperweight along with the 29 objects that were marketed as car mascots. Note that some of those 29 objects were dual marketed as paperweights.
 And there actually is a 31st Lalique Car Mascot, the mascot Levrier-1, believed to have been made as a non-commercial model for Prince George, the younger brother to Prince Edward (later King Edward VIII, and Prince Albert (later King George VI). This mascot is extremely hard to find.
In French, Lalique was selling Bouchons De Radiateur; radiator caps. Today they are referred to not just as Car Mascots, Bouchons De Radiateur, and Radiator Caps, but also Mascots, Mascottes, Hood Ornaments, and Figureheads.
A brief history of R. Lalique Car Mascots appears in the Biography of Rene Lalique here at RLalique.com, where you’ll also find useful links to all the Car Mascot resources and information on the website.
 The R. Lalique collector market is only a part of the demand for these great art glass mascots. Car collectors comprise a huge part of the market, car mascot collectors are also a big part of the demand, and to a lesser extent there is museum interest as well.
As is true in several other collecting areas (such as perfume bottles and opalescent art glass to name a couple), if you are a collector of Hood Ornaments, the most sought after are the ones from the great Rene Lalique.
 Complete R. Lalique Mascot collections rarely appear at auction.
There are only two in recent memory, one of which was part of the amazing Gerald Pulver R. Lalique collection. Before he passed away. Gerry lived in Key Biscayne Florida and at one time may have had the greatest collection of R. Lalique in the world. He was also a great guy and did a couple of great (unsung) things for the whole collecting field. A complete set picked from Gerry’s mascots was offered by Bonhams on May 1st, 2004 at their sale in Brookline Massachusetts along with additional lots of individual mascots from his deep collection. The catalog from that auction is available in the Lalique Library. It can be found in the Library section on modern auction catalogues that partially contain R. Lalique. It has photographs of the entire collection as well as all of the individual lots and the sales results. The catalog stock number is 657 and we only have two left to sell.
The other complete collection, and the one we are most interested in, appeared at RM Auctions in September 2000.
It was said to be one of two complete collections owned by Marvin Tamaroff, and it sold at that auction for $550,000.
 We are reliably informed that the collection coming up for auction on March 10th at RM Auctions in Florida is that same collection.
The pre-sale estimate is $800,000 – $1,200,000 but the collection is offered with NO RESERVE!
The collection on offer is currently owned by Ele Chesny.
She is known throughout the antique auto world as one of the great car collectors, and she may be the foremost female collector in the field.
Without reserve and therefore definitely selling, it should be an interesting and exciting sale day for the works of Rene Lalique.
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February 15th, 2012
 Rene Lalique Red Vases do extremely well at auction, as evidenced by a string of world record prices for different R.Lalique Vase models in red glass over the last few years. Recent examples include a red glass Perruches Vase which sold at Bonhams in London on November 16th, 2011 as Lot 157 in their sale, “Rene Lalique: Designs in Glass” for £42,050 (about $68,000 at that time), as well as the red glass Rene Lalique Hirondelles Vase which famously made a world record auction hammer price for any R. Lalique colored glass production vase in November of 2010. And also on December 9th, 2010 a Red Ronces Vase selling as Lot 56 made £10,000 British Pounds at Christie’s South Kensington (about $16,000 at the time); also a likely world record price at auction for the Ronces Vase model.
And while red glass vases have done extremely well as of late, the world records have not been limited to either red or rare, as shown by the opalescent glass Rennes Vase, which made a world record price for that model selling as Lot 10-875 on November 17th, 2011 at Christies South Kensington in London for £18,750 or about $30,000 at the time! A person (and a hat-tip to our confederate “Pol” from south of the equator for being that person and bringing this to our attention) could make the case that in some respects, the relatively common Rennes Vase making that kind of price is more impressive than any of the red stuff.
 But be that as it may, the numbers are much bigger when bidders see red; red and rare being an explosive combination in the price department. February 11th, 2012 in Detroit at Dumouchelles auction house was no exception. For on that day, an R. Lalique Courges Vase appeared in Lalique’s red glass. Introduced in 1914, the Courges Vase is one of Lalique’s earliest production vases. Red Courges are rarely seen at auction, the last time being the Red Courges at Davidson Auctions in Australia on August 8th, 2008 where it sold for AUD41,940 all-in against a pre-sale estimate of AUD9,000 to AUD11,000. The final price was about $38,000 U.S. at that time.
And note that there is an active private market as well for all models and colors of R. Lalique, the red Courges being no exception (well activity is limited a bit by rarity:). We placed a red Courges Vase through the Lalique Wanted section here at RLalique.com near the end of 2011 in a transaction between clients of two different countries. That placement came after over 2 years of searching for one of course.
The Courges is one of Rene Lalique earliest vases, with both the shape of the vase and the design on the vase being in harmony with the vase’s gourd motif.
 Another great thing about the Courges is that it many times has multiple interesting signatures, owing to the manufacturing techniques of the period; the Dumouchelles example being no exception as shown in the accompanying photo. Other Courges multi-signature examples can be seen in the linked article on authentic R Lalique Signatures here on the THE website.
The auction house reports that there were at least 8 serious bidders, with a handful still bidding near the end.
 We talked to some of those interested parties and they all had great things to say about the professionalism and excellent service they found at Dumouchelles, something we at World Headquarters have also experienced in our contacts with everyone at Dumouchelles. The active bidders included collectors and dealers from continental Europe, England, the U.S. and at least one other continent. Hopefully, several of the bidders will have remembered to tell Dumouchelles what auction houses around the world have been hearing for years on their R.Lalique items; “I saw it at RLalique.com!”.
One final note from the auction house: On Wednesdays, Dumouchelles holds open consignment days, where people just walk-in with what they have to offer, and the auction house never knows what might appear. Well, the great Red Courges Vase walked-in on a Wednesday (and flew out on a Saturday). Go figure.
Against a pre-sale estimate of $3000 to $6000, the final price was $47,500, and with the buyers 20% premium, $57,000. The world record for this vase model, and a great R. Lalique result.
How rare is the red glass Courges Vase? Well, after leaving the factory and the retailers back in the day, it’s unlikely that two of these vases have ever been together in the same room again …… until recently. The accompanying Two Red Courges photo shows a pair of the great and rare vases sitting together on a window shelf. They are part of an extensive current collection of R. Lalique items. One of the two pictured Courges is the vase acquired thru the Lalique Wanted section here at RLalique.com, having appeared quite literally out the blue (out of the red?) in an email a while back that began; “I am in possession of a vase that appears in your Wanted Section …. “. True enough the writer was.
And yes we know; several of the underbidders this week on the Dumouchelles Red Courges are seeing double red themselves after viewing this great double Courges photo!
A red hot market for the great Rene Lalique.
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February 11th, 2012
Rene Lalique Jewelry hit another auction sales home run at Sotheby’s Important Jewels auction on February 9th, 2012 in New York City. Tucked into the middle of the two session sale were four R. Lalique jewelry items, all thought to be unique pieces from the period before 1905.
 In summary, the four lots were estimated in total at $255,000 to $340,000. Against this estimate, the four made $652,000, or over 2 and 1/2 times the low estimate and nearly double the high one.
Lot 253 was the high seller of the group; a wonderful combination Lalique pendant-brooch, with a small watch where you might typically find the trademark suspended natural pearl.
Two coherent pieces, finished well both back and front, they made $188,500 against and estimated $75,000 – $100,000.
2nd high seller and a personal favorite of this writer was Lot 252, a typically designed and presented Lalique Pendant with an off-white enamel face, blue enamel poppies, yellow-green enamel leaves, and sporting a gray-lavender drop pearl. This wonderful Lalique Jewel is shown in a drawing on Page 274 in the seminal work by Sigrid Barten titled Rene Lalique Schmuck und Objects d’art which is available in the Lalique Books section here at RLalique.com.
This amazing piece of R. Lalique artwork made $176,500 against an estimate of $60,000 – $80,000.
 3rd place went to the Dragonfly Pendant-Brooch selling as Lot 254 and featuring two facing dragonflies done up in blue, teal, white, and plate blue plique-a-jour enamel, and having a central oval cabochon opal, white opal spindleberries, and stems enameled in white.
The missing pin did not deter bidders from pushing it up to $170,500 against an estimate of $60,000 – $80,000.
4th in price, was Lot 255, a two part offering consisting of a matching Lalique Brooch and Lalique Clasp. Each piece had a central amethyst, each featured white, cream and pink enamel work, each had a well worked mirrored gold patterned back, and the Brooch additionally showed clusters of iridescent glass raspberries.
The nice matched pair made $116,500 again the thrice low $60,000 – $80,000 estimate.
The nearly 400 lot sale at the company’s York Avenue salesrooms totaled just over $10,000,000, with the Lalique Jewelry comprising but 1% of the offered items, yet making over 6% of the sale total.
Once again, the market continues strong as more buyers recognize not just the attractiveness of the works of Rene Lalique, but also Lalique’s importance in art history and the art nouveau and art deco movements. You can find out more about Rene Lalique Jewelry and entire amazing story about the life of the great man by visiting the Rene Lalique Biography, here at RLalique.com: THE Worldwide Gathering Place For Rene Lalique Collectors and R. Lalique Enthusiasts!
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December 18th, 2011
 Richard Burton, perhaps the most well known among the 8 husbands and other loves of Elizabeth Taylor, was apparently the most prolific jewelry buyer in her life. Burton gave Taylor some incredible pieces of jewelry including for example a pearl (not pictured here) from the 1500’s once owned by England’s Mary Tudor and for which Burton paid $37,000 in 1969. This pearl was found in the Gulf of Panama in the early 16th century at a time when Spain was exploring and colonizing the new world. At the time, it was the biggest pearl known, being 56 carats!
It was taken to Spain by Don Pedro de Temez, the administrator of the Panama Colony and presented to King Philip. Philip gave the “La Peregrina Pearl” (la peregrina means the pilgrim or the wanderer) to Queen Mary as a wedding present when they got married in 1544, and it appears in a portrait from that same year of Queen Mary The 1st, painted by Hans Eworth; a painting that Taylor and Burton helped the National Portrait Gallery in Great Britain to acquire in 1972. This pearl reverted to King Philip on Mary’s death, and was part of the Crown Jewels of Spain for around 250 years. Several portraits exist of royalty wearing this pearl including portraits painted by Diego Velazquez. In 1808 Napoleon Bonaparte put his brother Joseph (Giuseppe) on the Spanish throne, but Joe’s time as King of Spain lasted just 5 years due to some setbacks for the Bonaparte crowd and the Spanish not taking too kindly to an imposed French King. Being a first class guy, Joe grabbed the pearl (and a lot of other jewelry) on the way out the door as he fled.
Joseph ended up living in the United States for roughly 15 years from about 1817 to 1832, mainly in New Jersey, where among his other activities he had two American daughters by a mistress. When Joseph died he left the pearl to his nephew Charles Louis Bonaparte, who later was Emperor Bonaparte. Charles sold the pearl while exiled in England to James Hamilton, who would become the Duke of Abercorn (an interesting guy that fathered 14 kids by one wife and who among other things was the Grandmaster of the Grand Lodge of Ireland!). The pearl stayed in his family until 1969 when it was auctioned at Sotheby’s to Burton, who gave it to Taylor as a present! Can you imagine a better or longer provenance? The pearl sold this week for near $12 million! You can watch a video of the sale of this pearl (and a couple other lots from this auction) at the Christie’s website here.
But the Richard Burton gift of interest to us is the blue and green glass R. Lalique Pendant *** featuring a medusa head in a frame of gold serpents with blue and green enamel and having the Lalique trademark single suspended pearl. A much smaller pearl than the one previously discussed. 🙂
This wonderful Lalique Pendant appeared in New York in the sale of the Collection of Elizabeth Taylor Jewelry as Lot Number 281 estimated at $40,000 – $60,000; a not so hidden gem amongst the raft of big gemstone offerings. When the hammer came down, the total sale price including buyers premium was an over 10 times estimate $566,500.
A pearl of a result for a great example of the art that is Rene Lalique jewelry.
If you want to learn more about the great jewelry of Lalique, you’ll find insightful reporting and links to the extensive information at RLalique.com in the R.Lalique Biography section for Lalique’s Jewelry!
*** Christie’s has identified this great object as a brooch. The form of this object appears to us to more closely resemble an R. Lalique pendant than a brooch. An inspection of whatever pin is on the back of the piece, which we have not seen, would settle the question from among the various possiblities.
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December 15th, 2011
Yes friends, you read it right. It turns out that there is a second identical twin of Rene Lalique (that would be identical triplets?), this latest one discovered by an enterprising R. Lalique dealer no less! You can see the amazing resemblance from the three photos that we dug out of the archives here at World Headquarters. The resemblance between the three photos is uncanny!
The hitherto unknown Sabino Lalique has apparently languished in obscurity for, well for over a 100 years until finally being discovered by an RLalique dealer moonlighting as a genealogist. We’ll just shorten that to Genie, which makes more sense than you might know. For as western readers of Arabian Nights will remember, Aladdin was granted wishes for doing what? For freeing the Genie from a LAMP! So Genie it is. And shown just below in the first photo is the Genie’s lamp, being sold under the auction title “Illuminated nude figure believed to be by Sabino Lalique”!
 And to think the fruit of all the Genie research is being given away for a mere £650 on Ebay no less. Just when the thought occurs to you that every story ever to be told has been told, a good morning laugh awaits.
Of course, all this would be merely ridiculous if some guy picked up a piece of opalescent glass at a garage sale and claimed or inferred some relation to Rene Lalique (of course maybe that’s what happened here :). But when a longtime R. Lalique dealer ties in the great Rene Lalique to this? Well, ridiculous would be most kind. We especially like how Genie tossed out Suzanne this and that in the auction ad. We’ve got a creative thinking Genie here for sure, with some real ingenie-ous tendencies!
 Funny thing is that even the Sabino thing might be questionable. We are not Sabino experts, so it might be Sabino for all we know. It might be Fenton too. Heck for all we know, it might be Picasso’s girlfriend in a one-off glass creation that old Pablo thought up after a basketball game.
Seriously, to be frank (and yes, pun intended as you’ll see shortly) if we had to throw out an equally likely possibility in our minds, we’d propose FRANKART glass as a good guess.
Frankart glass you ask? Well yes there is such a thing. And the 2nd photo shows what is advertised as Frankart and identified as a portrayal of Sally Rand (real name Harriet Beck), the famous Deco and Depression era flapper burlesque star! Sally was especially noted for her ostrich feather fan dance AND her balloon bubble dance!
In Chicago during the 1933 World’s Fair, Sally was arrested four times on the same day for indecent exposure while riding a white horse thru the City while seemingly (but not really) nude!
And ignoring Genie, whom we’ve never met, there’s more of an esoteric ying-yang relationship with Sally Rand and our own experience than meets the eye, all from reading the articles and never looking at the pictures of course, and which explains why we’re so interested in Sally. You see, Sally was arrested for going around creating the illusion of indecency, whereas some people we know in certain circles*** are busy doing just the opposite; going around creating the illusion of decency. Hmmmm.
  And when you look at the details of these two pieces together, the one attributed to Sabino Lalique and the one attributed to Frankart and to Sally Rand, well the thought occurs to expansive thinkers that old Sabino Lalique might have worked for Frankart at some point and used some of his old ideas to create similar glass figures. Heck, while Rene Lalique was busy associating with Sarah Bernhardt, old Sabino must have been out flapping his wings, taking in a little Burlesque, and associating with an entirely different group of glamorous people. How else would he have met Sally and known about the balloon bubble burlesque thing to use for a lamp design?
The whole thing is Genie-us!
The final touch in the online ad for the Sabino Lalique lamp are the entire “Terms and conditions of the sale”: “It is quite normal on R Lalique pieces to have a certain amount of bubbles or lines and small imperfections related to the manufacturing of the piece and also a certain amount of wear and scratches is expected due to their age. I would be happy to deal with any queries and explain the extent of these details about any item.”
Ignoring the obvious question: “What exactly does this have to do with the lamp?”, why not S Lalique? 🙂
*** Circle, as used here, has several synonyms in the Merriam-Webster Thesaurus including pack, ring, crowd, and bunch.
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November 28th, 2011
Likely a world record price for any Lalique Car Mascot at auction was achieved on Saturday November 26th in Chester Springs Pennsylvania, smack in the middle of old Hunt Country west of Philadelphia. The unsigned R. Lalique Renard Hood Ornament appeared at Wiederseim Associates Inc. Auction House, run by Ted And Jill Wiederseim, just a stone’s throw *** from Rhoads Auction House which sold the great Red Hirondelles Vase in November 2010.
Because the rare mascot was not signed and was amongst hundreds of porcelain and other decorative foxes all out of the same house, it was understandably not catalogued as a period R. Lalique glass mascot. It was sold as part of Lot 515 shown above, with four other decorative foxes all for the single estimate of $100-$150. An alert staffer here at RLalique.com spotted the above photo amongst the thousands of auction reports that pour into World Headquarters on a daily basis, and recognized the rare R.Lalique Renard (the French word for fox), likely the rarest and most valuable of all commercial Rene Lalique Car Mascot models. We promptly informed the auction house of the likely amazing treasure they had hidden in plain sight, and placed the great fox in the Worldwide Auction Listings here on the website. This triggered immediate inquiries into Wiederseim from all over the world.
Much was made in certain circles about the lack of signature on the great fox. But as readers of this website are aware, R. Lalique pieces are not authenticated by their signatures. They speak for themselves.
The certain circles we refer to are a couple of R Lalique dealers one of which has disparaged the mascot in what we consider outrageous circumstances, while the other dealer was apparently just completely making stuff up. Both circulated information to the effect that this great item was possibly a “factory reject” (how many of you have seen an R Lalique “factory reject”, or heard that term used in reference to R. Lalique?), and both have also inferred at times that it might not be a genuine R. Lalique car mascot.
Strangely, while knocking down the piece (and maybe by happenstance knocking down the number of bidders and the price the remaining bidders might be willing to pay :), both dealers reserved phone lines for phone bidding!!!! You cannot make this stuff up.
One of these dealers, let’s call this person “Hound Dog”, went so far as to post commentary on the internet even the day after the sale, questioning if the piece was even genuine, disparaging the condition and the price paid, and suggesting it might be a modern copy of some sort. This again, was after reserving a phone bid line and being on the phone with the auction house during the bidding.
The second dealer, let’s call this person “Humpty Dumpty” has seemingly made up the fact that the mascot was broken apart in a significant way in at least a couple of places and glued back together! And he sent emails out to this effect prior to the auction, along with a scandalous theory of a Lalique factory worker picking the parts of the rejected piece out of a trash bin at the factory and taking them home to put them back together again as best he could! Friends, it’s story time in Fantasy Land.
 Oh, Humpty Dumpty also stated as fact in his emails that all R. Lalique pieces were signed before leaving the factory. This is obviously incorrect, and we would refer Mr. Dumpty and all readers to the article here at RLalique.com discussing Authentic Rene Lalique Signatures and to the page on Authentic R Lalique Signatures as well for more information on this point.
So while the yelping from the sideshow was a bit of a distraction leading up to the sale, it did nothing to curb the enthusiasm of bidders from all over the world as many collectors lined up to try and acquire this seldom seen mascot.
The auction house, having only two international capable phones, had to acquire additional phones for the worldwide bidding scramble that ensued upon our listing the fox here! U.S. phone bidders were also heard from, as were a couple of bidders in the room during the sale, including one well known long time dealer who personally inspected the fox before wading into the bidding.
In the end, with the price starting at $25,000 and moving up quickly from there, two phone bidders both from the UK, left the competition behind, reportedly at around $140,000 to $150,000, and took it up to $175,000 ($204,750 with the buyers premium) before the hammer came down on this historic sale of the unassuming, unsigned, but no longer unsung Lalique Hood Ornament.
If you are wondering how the Renard Mascot came to Wiederseim, here is the short version:
 Pierre Samuel du Pont de Nemours came from France to the United States in 1800 with his two sons Victor Marie du Pont and Eleuthère Irénée du Pont. Eleuthère started up a little company called E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company (most people today just say DuPont). At the start, they made gunpowder. No need to discuss the entire history of the duPont Family in America, but several generations removed from the auspicious start as gunpowder makers, a descendant, John Eleuthère duPont was born in 1938 in Philadelphia. He was the son of William duPont Jr., who among other things, imported from England the famous racehorse The Satrap, winner of the Chesham Stakes at Ascot, the Richmond Stakes at Goodwood, and at Newmarket both the Chesterfield Stakes and the July Stakes. In 1996, John tragically shot and killed (yes, using gunpowder) a U.S. Olympic Gold Medal Wrestler named Dave Shultz who was living on his Foxcatcher Farm estate, a property John had taken over after the death of his mother and which he had named Foxcatcher after his father’s famous horse racing stable. John was found guilty of murder in 1997 and died in prison in 2010.
John collected decorative foxes, lots of them. And after his death, and after the house had been swept through by a major New York City based auction house to have their pick of the most valuable items (oops, they missed something), a slew of decorative foxes along with a ton of other stuff were turned over to Wiederseim for auction. Among the relatively low value foxes was the great R. Lalique Renard Car Mascot about which we write today; missed once but not twice, now with the duPont provenance, and headed off to the UK with a world record price tag.
For more information about Lalique’s car mascots including links to all mascot resources on the website, visit the Rene Lalique Biography Car Mascots section here at THE address on the web for everything R. Lalique.
***Stone’s Throw – slang for a short distance (heck, how far can you throw a stone?)
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