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The contents of the historic Flaxley Abbey will be going on sale on Monday 3 October at Dreweatts. The collection is a fascinating and storied selection of works of art, furniture and pictures which have been inherited, collected and worked on by owners, architects and designers spanning over 500 years.
Flaxley Abbey is a strikingly romantic house in Gloucestershire whose current interiors were designed by the renowned theatre and set designer Oliver Messel, uncle to Princess Margaret's husband Anthony Armstrong Jones and the creative mind behind some truly iconic interiors of the mid-twentieth century. The Dorchester still preserves the Oliver Messel Suite he designed in 1953 for the Queen's coronation, and his 1946 design for The Royal Ballet's Sleeping Beauty, which starred Margot Fonteyn, was immortalised in the first ever colour broadast of a ballet, and was revived in 2006.
Flaxley Abbey is the only country house ever designed and remodelled by Messel, and one of a dwindling number of his interiors still in existence. Theatrical and colourful, the rooms he created include some important pieces that will be included in the auction, many of which are from Messel's own collection or designed by him.
While Flaxley Abbey dates back to 1151, it has been home to many families during that time – most notably the Crawley-Boevey Baronets to whom it owes its fascinating collection of Old Master portraits. When they eventually sold the house in 1960, its contents were offered at auction and snapped up by the new owners, thus keeping much of this collection together. The new owners then brought in Messel to redesign the interiors.
Messel supplied a substantial number of items from his own family's houses, including Nymans in West Sussex, which is now open to the public via the National Trust, and his London house on Pelham Place. These items have remained at Flaxley for the last 60 years, so this sale presents a fascinating insight into the private collection of Oliver Messel and his family.
The auction will be hosted at Dreweatts Donnington Priory salerooms on 3 October 2022.
