Editor’s Note
The lines between art, collectibles, and luxury goods are increasingly blurred. As this article highlights, high-end watches, handbags, and cars are no longer mere sidelines for auction houses but have become central, multi-billion dollar growth engines, strategically competing with fine art for market dominance.
From New York to Abu Dhabi, from Hermès to Ferrari, luxury has crept into the art market. Auction houses like Sotheby’s and Christie’s are posting billions in sales from jewelry, cars, watches, handbags, and sneakers. What was once a sideline is increasingly becoming a strategic growth driver, competing with art.
The luxury sector is particularly fueling the business of major players in the auction market, such as Sotheby’s and Christie’s. But the French auction house Artcurial is also heavily focused on this segment, regularly holding auctions in Monaco dedicated exclusively to high-end luxury with classic cars, watches, jewelry, and Hermès handbags. Vienna’s Dorotheum has long been active in the fields of classic cars, jewelry, watches, and also handbags, and competitor im Kinsky expanded its offerings in 2023 to include watches and jewelry. A clear sign that regional auction houses also want to actively participate in this market.
Sotheby’s recorded $2.7 billion in sales in the luxury segment alone in 2025, a 22 percent increase from the previous year and about one-third of its total business volume. Christie’s turned over $795 million in the same category, representing 17 percent growth. While the market for classical art has declined sharply in recent years, the luxury sector has seen robust demand.
Luxury items are an attractive business for auction houses because they reach a much broader customer base, which is important at a time when the buyer structure is fundamentally changing. On one hand, a generational shift is taking place, and on the other, geopolitical purchasing power is shifting. While classical art has traditionally appealed primarily to Western collectors, luxury goods target a new audience, such as younger buyers and buyers from Asia, the Middle East, and increasingly Africa. The reasons are obvious: art often requires expertise and time to engage with. Limited-edition sneakers, handbags, or jewelry work more directly and without high barriers to entry. The sense of prestige is also immediate.
Christie’s already recorded 38 percent of all new customers coming from the luxury segment, many of them from the Millennial or Gen Z generations. Overall, the share of this younger clientele grew to 33 percent; at Sotheby’s, one-third of the bidders at the Collectors’ Week in Abu Dhabi were under 40. A major topic is the further globalization of markets. Sotheby’s achieved $133 million in Abu Dhabi alone during the Collectors’ Week, with buyers from 35 countries, many of them new to the auction system. In Asia, buyers from Southeast Asia accounted for 37 percent of Christie’s global luxury sales.
Additionally, the margins are right. High-quality wristwatches or collector cars, much like art, offer opportunities for spectacular individual sales. For example, a 1994 McLaren F1 fetched $25.3 million at Sotheby’s last year, a rare 32-carat pink diamond changed hands in Abu Dhabi for $8.8 million, and a Hermès Birkin Bag owned by Jane Birkin herself sold for over ten million, making it the most expensive handbag ever auctioned.
The pandemic played a key role in the triumph of the luxury segment. It forced auction houses to digitalize. Today, over half of all sales take place online. Christie’s, for example, launched the “Christie’s Shop” platform, offering curated watches available daily, completely independent of the auction calendar. This “see-now-buy-now” principle is particularly popular with the generation of digital natives.
But it’s not just auction houses increasingly focusing on the luxury segment; within the art world itself, points of contact are growing. The two global fair brands, Frieze and Art Basel, have in recent years deliberately entered into partnerships with luxury brands like Tiffany & Co., Miu Miu, Prada, or Louis Vuitton. However, these houses are no longer limiting themselves to background sponsorship but are actively engaging in the scene with curated programs and special events. This also draws critics who warn of a creeping aestheticization of consumption and the instrumentalization of art for brand messages.