The final sell-off
What an auction of Margaret Thatcher’s effects reveals about her
IT WAS an eclectic set of items that went under the hammer at Christie’s auction house on December 15th. They came from the collection of the late Baroness Thatcher of Kesteven. The auction raised over £3m ($5m), six times pre-sale estimates, with buyers from as far afield as South Korea, Switzerland and Bermuda. There were brooches, books, pictures, letters and papers, a red dispatch box (sold for £242,500) and, inevitably, handbags. Yet what stood out were the frocks, gowns and coats, including her wedding dress (£25,000) and another believed to be the one she wore to address the House of Commons for the last time as prime minister, on November 22nd 1990.
This article appeared in the Britain section of the print edition under the headline “The final sell-off”
From the December 19th 2015 edition
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