Elizabeth Taylor Jewelry Auction: The One-Week Wrap-Up

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The video above screened one week ago at the beginning of the Elizabeth Taylor’s Legendary Jewels auction at Christie’s. Skip forward to 2:32 when the actress does some over-the-phone pool-side bidding at the 1987 auction of Duchess of Windsor’s jewelry. “Darling, it sounds like things that are really desirable are going to go for ten times what expected, right?” she asks. Taylor’s own words were the perfect way to start the series of sales where items went for 10, 20 or 50 times the estimates. Now that the legendary sale wrapped up, we pulled together all of the over-the-top figures that made this the most successful jewelry auction of all time—read them below.

• 26 of her jewels sold for over $1 million dollars.• 4 pieces sold for more than $5 million.• The most expensive item in the sale was the $11,842,500 Peregrina Pearl Necklace. When the bidding began for the jewel there were million dollar bids being shouted across the room.• By the time the final gavel came down on all of Elizabeth Taylor’s jewelry sales the grand total was $137,235,575, plus millions more in the online sale.• The Duchess of Windsor brooch Taylor successful won in 1987 for $623,000 was among the items. It sold for more than double the estimate at $1,314,500. Talk about desirable.Check out some of the most memorable pieces from the sale in the gallery now.

— Marion Fasel