Luxury Lifestyle, Design & Architecture blog

In September we told you about Rembrandt ’s legendary ‘Portrait of a Man’ would be going under the hammer. Well, it did last week. And the new and extremely proud owner of this materpiece is none other than the casino mogul Steve Wynn. From what we hear, he splurged a huge and record $33.2 million at the grand auction hosted by Christie’s in London last week. Let us remind you that this painting dates back to 1658 and has the portrait of a man, half-length with his arms akimbo. An insider told us that Mr. Wynn made the winning big over the teleophone. Though Wynn has not officially revealed that he was the winning buyer but there has been serious speculation more so after NY Times reported that he had consulted many art dealers and scholars to check their opinions of the piece before the sale. Most of us are quite sure as far as Wynn is concerned because he is quite and art afficionado and already possess pieces by Rubens, Vermeer and Cezanne. Not just that, he also ...

An Aston Martin will always be an Aston Martin. Before you think we have gone ga ga in the head (like a certain madam who sometimes sings when she isn’t flaming controversies), let us tell you that a 1965 Aston Martin DB5 Vantage Convertible is making news. The beautiful car is one of the nine ever produced and eats rare status earned it a remarkable price tag of £551,500. The sale took place at the Bonhams annual Collectors’ Motor Cars and Automobile auction at Goodwood Festival of Speed. As automobile enthusiasts would already know, the Vantage engine is extremely powerful. So you know that the car comes with a strong make. It has seen three owners with two comprehensive restorations. In fact, we even got to see it at the prestigious, invitation-only Concorso d’Eleganza Villa d’Este last year. The Aston wasn’t the only thing that went under the hammer. There was a 1937 Bentley (featured in the Bond film “Never Say Never Again”) that was sold for £221,500. A rare Liste...