By Tim Saunders on
Barbra Streisand is set to auction many of her personal items for charity.
Julien’s Auctions will host the auction, to be held October 17-18, with more than 400 items to go under the hammer.
“What good does it do in storage,” said the 67-year-old. “Let someone else enjoy it. These things, they’re not forever. We pass them on and reap the benefits for something important.”
Proceeds from the auction – to be held at the Beverly Hills Hotel – will go to the Streisand Foundation, which gives grants to “national organizations working on preservation of the environment, voter education, the protection of civil liberties and civil rights, women’s issues and nuclear disarmament” and has given large donations to programs related to women’s health.
Among the beneficiaries will be City Year, which Streisand said “brings together a core of diverse young leaders that provide vital resources to youth in local neighborhoods”; the Clinton Foundation (“We gave a big chunk to the climate change initiative”); and the Cedars-Sinai Women's Heart Health Center, which supports cardiac research for women.
“For decades women have been treated based on medical research done on men,” said Streisand. “So it’s about time that proper research be done and communicated to women so they’ll be more informed about their health.”
Auction lots include a wicker chair from her sunroom, a baby grand piano, many designer dresses, costumes from films such as “Funny Lady,” “The Way We Were” and “Meet the Fockers,” an old phonograph she bought when she was 18 and “one of the first pieces of furniture I ever bought: A dental cabinet. That’s hard to part with actually. I wish I had room for it. I don’t.”
Selections from the auction will be on public view aboard the Queen Mary 2 during its trans-Atlantic cruise this month and then in Ireland, New York and Beverly Hills.
“The community is better served if I get rid of it and give all the proceeds to my foundation, which does really good work,” she said.
To view the lots and find out more, visit the Julien’s Auctions website.
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