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Lalanne Jockeys

The latest offerings at Christie’s, Sotheby’s, and Phillips anticipate a still-strong design market, with a wide selection of works by Les Lalanne—including a multimillion-dollar hippo—leading the category alongside Tiffany, Giacometti, and the recently deceased Frank Gehry.

Francois Xavier Lalanne, Hippopotame Bar
The star of the sale—prominently featured in the lobby of the Breuer Building during Sotheby’s heavily trafficked debut last month—is a copper hippopotamus bar commissioned by Schlumberger in 1976, now carrying its highest estimate ever at $7 million. Photo: Courtesy of Sotheby’s
Marion Maneker
December 9, 2025

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While the art market has just pulled out of a three-year slump, the design market has never flagged over that period—buoyed in part by the growing appetite for surrealist objects made by the French couple Claude and François-Xavier Lalanne. Fortuitously, the market for these pieces has risen at the same time that a generation of collectors—including some of the couple’s most loyal patrons—have either met their demise or decided to sell their works. It’s the rare case where supply and demand are seemingly perfectly calibrated to drive up interest from bidders.