The catalogues (or 'magalogues' as the auctioneers have dubbed them) are soft-bound A3-sized publications and will accompany the monthly House Sale launched in New York in 2002 and Christie's South Kensington's At Home series which followed a year later.
CSK's first magalogue - the cover pictured right - will appear this week to accompany the first of this year's eight At Home events, scheduled for March 15-17.
Instead of the three or four similarly-branded catalogues that hitherto accompanied each At Home series, everything will now be grouped together in the single large-scale magazine catalogue. For retail shopping-style ease and clarity, material will be grouped by category, with sections for carpets, furniture, ceramics, paintings, silver etc. Each entry will also be accompanied by a small size image, the first time a Christie's catalogue has illustrated every lot in a sale. Additional features will include introductory lifestyle articles and sale highlights.
The newlook 'lifestyle' publication is described by CSK's chairman Hugh Edmeades as "something dramatic, smart, approachable, bold and breezy, while retaining the integrity of our catalogue expertise." It is not, however, the type of publication that fits conveniently in a back pocket.
Like CSK's new weekend opening hours, the magalogue is yet another attempt by Christie's to broaden their customer base by wooing the private customer. The catalogues cost £10, less (assuming you wanted them all) than the aggregated price of the individual catalogues that formerly made up each At Home series.
