$1.7m Not Enough To Buy Irish Chair

Vincent Murphy reports from Christie's Auction house in New York as two items from acclaimed Irish designer Eileen Gray go under the hammer.

How much would you pay for this chair? If your answer was anything below $2m, then forget about it.

At Christies at Rockefeller Plaza last week, the item failed to sell despite bids of up to $1.7m.

The elegant piece of furniture was designed by the Irish-born art decor legend Eileen Gray more than 90 years ago.

Relatively unknown during her lifetime, especially in Ireland, she has become super-trendy among collectors in recent years.

Last year in Paris, a leather armchair by the same designer, entitled Fauteil aux Dragons (The Dragon's Chair) sold for a staggering $29.2m at auction. It had been in the private collection of the late French fashion designer Yves Saint

Laurent and his partner Pierre Bergé.

That sale set a new record high for a piece of 20th century furniture.

So you can imagine the buzz in the room, when the latest Eileen Gray chair to come to the market - Siréne - went up for sale last week.

The brochure described it as "a lacquered and painted beech armchair", that "exemplifies the first chapter of Eileen Gray's career, as a creator of luxurious and exotic furnishings".

It had been designed by Ms Gray for her close friend, and rumoured lover, the French chanteuse Damia 1917-1919.

The ornate piece, with a signature mermaid motif on its back, and a warm coloured velvet seat, took pride of place on the auction room display stage.

It was expected by many to make tens of millions.

Bidding started at $1.2 million, and quickly went up in $100k increments to $1.7m.

But in a major surprise, there it stalled.

The auctioneer soon passed the sale for failing to reach the reserve - in other words, the chair was withdrawn from sale because it had not attracted a big enough price to satisfy the current owners.

It's a truly astonishing thing to say - but I was in a room where someone offered $1.7m to buy a chair, and it wasn't enough!

So why didn't it sell?

It's hard to tell but one explanation is that potential buyers were put off by fears that the price would skyrocket in they way it had in Paris last year.

Christies has put an estimate on the chair of $2-3m, and had said in advance they believed it was a conservative estimate, aimed at not deterring bidders.

It was certainly not because the market for multi-million-dollar-chairs had evaporated.

Within minutes of the Eileen Gray chair failing to sell, another chair sold for over $2 million.

(It was a bronze armchair by Armond Albert Rateau, if you must know!)

And it certainly was not because Ms Gray's standing as a leading designer has in any ways faded.

Later in the auction, a wooden "brick" screen (pictured), designed by Eileen Gray went under the hammer for $842,500.

It was a beautiful piece - as much a work of art as a piece of furniture.

It was purchased by a telephone bidder, who remained anonymous, but whom we can assume is a serious collector, as he/she also bought several other items during the sale.

The screen was one of two which Eileen Gray kept all her life in her own Paris apartment.

The matching one is now owned by the National Museum of Ireland, and is currently on display at the Collins Barracks Museum in Dublin.

So if multi-million dollar auctions are out of your reach, it's possible to see the screen for free, along with other Eileen Gray designs, when you next visit Dublin.

Eileen Gray is a fascinating figure, given that Ireland is hardly well known for its contribution to the world of art décor design.

She was born to an aristocratic family in Enniscorthy, Co Wexford in 1878, but lived most of her adult life in France where she worked as an architect and was a leading figure in the art décor movement.

She died in Paris in 1976 at the age of 98.

Her output as a designer was relatively small, and the surviving treasures that define her career are scarce.

As for the Siréne chair, it remains in the possession of a private collector in Colorado.

But the possibility of a private mutli-million dollar sale, even in the absence of an international bidding war, remains.

My only regret, as I walked out into the freezing winter at Rockefeller Plaza, was not making an attempt to sit on it while I was in the same room.

What must it feel like to sit in chair worth several million bucks?