Farwell building tiles taken off Sotheby"s auction from Crain's
Pardon the pun, but it didn’t take long for a planned auction of a pair of Tiffany Studios ceiling fragments from the Farwell Building in Capitol Park to get … um, scrapped.
Louis Aguilar had a good story in the Detroit News Wednesday about the planned auction of the pieces that historic preservation experts told him were likely stolen/scrapped from the eight-story building at 1249 Griswold St.
So here’s what happened, according to Darrell Rocha, director of Sotheby’s Press Office in the Americas.
"Late last night Sotheby’s received a formal claim from parties asserting rightful ownership, and in turn withdrew the works from today’s auction. Until that time, we had received no such claim."
Rocha said that the claim was received around midnight.
“We have to investigate any claim that’s filed. This claim happened to come in circa midnight last night, so we can’t sort that out by 10 a.m. [[the scheduled auction time).”
Rocha said Sotheby’s retains possession of the two pieces, but not ownership.
He could not say who filed the ownership claim, nor if it was multiple people or groups claiming ownership.
"I can't wait to find out" who it is, said Rebecca Binno Savage, a historic preservation expert and the historic preservation lead for Detroit-based Kraemer Design Group PLC, which is the project architect on the redevelopment plans for the Farwell Building for first-floor retail space and more than 80 loft-style apartments.
The two pieces were described on the Sotheby’s website as mosaic ceiling fragments, with one estimated to fetch $3,000 to $5,000 and another estimated to garner $6,000 to $8,000 at auction.
The 110,000-square-foot Farwell Building, which is owned by Richard Karp of Lansing-based Karp and Associates, has been vacant for decades.
