Build your dream collection with the Strauss & Co Wishlist
13 Sep 2026
From dream buys to something within reach, the Strauss & Co Wishlist keeps tabs on what you love and notifies you when it comes up for auction.
What’s on your art wishlist? Vladimir Tretchikoff’s iconic Lady from the Orient perchance? Perhaps a JH Pierneef linocut, or a brightly coloured Sam Nhlengethwa collage you can already picture above the sofa? How about something by a hot young artist? We’d suggest all of them! That’s the pleasure of a wishlist: for the moment you don’t have to choose. The wildly ambitious, the actually attainable and everything in between can all go on the list.
How it works
We’re used to online wishlists being somewhere to park the things we like but aren’t quite ready to buy. Strauss & Co’s version goes a step further: tell it what you’re looking for, and it keeps an eye out for you. It could be a particular artist, maker or designer, or a whole category. You can then narrow things down by subject matter and, rather importantly, price. When something that fits the bill comes up at auction, you’ll receive an email. No trawling through every new sale just in case, although let’s be realistic, we love that too. The Wishlist does the looking for you.
Your Wishlist certainly doesn’t have to stop at art. Perhaps there’s an authentic Eames chair with your name on it, an Ardmore bowl, a gold charm bracelet or a piece of Georg Jensen silver that serves no obvious purpose, but you want it anyway.
Then there’s the cellar. How about a case of Bordeaux to put away for a landmark birthday, or a special bottle you’ve been hunting for. Old, new, useful, beautiful, wildly impractical: it can all happily coexist digitally. Your Wishlist doesn’t need a theme, a grand plan or even particularly good reasons.
But this isn’t just fantasy shopping. Set a price range that suits you and your Wishlist can be as practical as you want it to be. You might be keeping tabs on the dream piece, but you can just as easily be looking for something you’re ready to bid on now.
On the Wishlist
Johannesburg-based journalist and editor Sarah Buitendach is no stranger to a Strauss & Co auction. She’s been using the Wishlist for years, mostly to keep an eye on artists whose work she already knows and loves.
“I’ve always liked Sydney Carter and Erich Mayer. I grew up with the work of both painters and I love their colours. Carter almost has a graphic designer’s eye to his paintings. They might not be the trendiest or most popular names, but their work comes up quite regularly and having them on my Wishlist means I can keep tabs on what’s coming up.”
It has also led to a few purchases. One of the first was a Sydney Carter oil painting of a rondavel, followed by “little bits and pieces here and there”, including a small Erich Mayer she is “totally chuffed with”.
Currently, she has her eye on Adolph Jentsch. Two works came up recently, but neither was quite what she was looking for. “I felt they weren’t quintessentially Jentsch, so I waited. I’m Wishlisting Jentsch bigtime. I’ve got my eye on him.”
Some things will stay on the list, some you’ll decide weren’t quite right after all, and every now and then, one will make it home.
Ready to start your Wishlist? Log into your Strauss & Co profile (or sign up if you don’t already have one), click on Your Wishlists and start adding what you’re looking for. The looking is free. What happens when the right piece finally lands in your inbox is entirely up to you.
