Three days, with prices ranging from £millions to £100, of some of David Bowie's more arty possessions includes a bronze swallow door knocker by Gertrude Hermes, designed in 1926 and estimated at £3,000 - £5,000.
 
In Jane Hill's The Sculpture of Gertrude Hermes two door knockers by Hermes are mentioned - The Seal and Rampant Horse - and a note that AB Fine Art Foundry (originally Abercrombie and Andy) cast door knockers for Hermes. Abercrombie taught sculpture and bronze casting at Central School of Art which had the first natural draft furnace from about 1966.
 
The Swallow knocker was exhibited in 1932 concurrently with the Ideal Home Exhibition at Olympia concerned with 'recovery from chaos'. The knocker had Vorticist influences and was illustrated in the Architectural Review. The Times described Hermes works as the most completely satisfying, and intelligently formalised sculpture and as an 'Artist-Designer of Every-Day Things of Life'.
 
Hill wrote:

On the whole Hermes preferred the colour and animation of highly polished bronze to brass. Some, such as Swallow designed for Herberts, became amuletic: a bird in the hand invoking the protection of the house, while others, such as those for advocate and architect friends, indicate their social and professional customs

The sale is divided into three sections on three consecutive days. Fine Art on day one, Modern Art on day two (including the door knocker lot 260) and Modern Applied Art including some £100 lots (watch them soar away) on day three.
 
The Bowie sale is at Sotheby's 10 - 12 November 2016.