Big Stories in Collecting - 2025: Part 1 January to April

Although every year in the collectibles business has both ups and downs, my overriding recollection for 2025 is:

Record breaking. Here's everything you need to know.

January

Two £1-million guitars honour Jeff Beck’s legacy

A sale of Jeff Beck’s guitars saw both a Gibson Les Paul and a Fender Stratocaster sell for over £1 million.

Perhaps the two best-known guitar shapes of the rock ‘n’ roll era topped the Christie’s Beck sale because of the man who played them.

A 1954 Les Paul oxblood made £850,000 before fees that pushed it over £1 million. A white Strat had a pre-fee price of £800,000.

The £1 million mark is getting passed more and more often in this market.

A Beck Stratocaster that's definitely been played went for over £1 million. Image courtesy of Christie's.

February

Metal detector sets medieval English coin record

Everyone loves a treasure find.

And Michael Leigh-Mallory found a lovely gold coin in September 2024.

The Henry III penny he unearthed in Devon was sold in February this year for £648,000, setting a new high water mark for a single British-found coin, and a medieval British coin at auction.

Henry III penny, a lucky find for one metal detectorist.

March

Bourbon rips up the record book

An Old Rip Van Winkle Kentucky Bourbon from 2007 made $125,000 in New York in March to become the most valuable post-Prohibition American whiskey in history.

Sotheby’s sold the bottle, which flew past its $50,000 top estimate despite a label the blender’s son rush-printed on his home computer.

It took the crown from another Van Winkle bottle, distilled by a company that dates to the late 19th century.

The Van Winkle distillery keeps winning records. Image courtesy of Sotheby's.

April

Lengthy battle for lengthy scroll brings high price

A Chinese calligraphy scroll set the top price for any single item at Sotheby’s Hong Kong when it sold for $32 million in April.

At fully 10-metres long, the Rao Jie piece from the Yuan dynasty was suitably imposing.

Sotheby’s say the piece attracted 21-times its pre-sale estimate in a 95-minute bidding battle, that may be one of the longest in auction history.

The piece was created between 1271 to 1378 and has been in some of the world’s most important collections of Chinese art, including those of Chinese emperors.

Prophetic Titanic letter sets correspondence record

A letter by writer Archibald Gracie that said he would not judge his trip on the Titanic until he had landed became the most valuable letter sent from the ship, in April.

Titanic specialists Henry Aldridge & Son sold the missive for £300,000.

Gracie wrote the letter on board the ship and it was posted from there at the Titanic’s final stop in Ireland before crossing the Atlantic.

Gracie did survive the sinking and his account of the night of April 14, 1912 is one of the most complete we have. He died, probably because of his experiences in the wreck, a few months later.