SOTHEBY’s announced yesterday that it had won the business over its rival Christie’s and that it will offer exceptional fine art, jewelry, furniture and decoration from the collection of Rachel Lambert Mellon, who died earlier this year at the age of 103, in a series of auctions, this Fall in New York. The collection, which was acquired over a lifetime, is drawn from the Mellons' residences in the United States and abroad. The more than 2,000 individual items together have an estimated value in excess of $100 million. Proceeds from the sales will benefit The Gerard B. Lambert Foundation, a charitable entity established by Mrs. Mellon in memory of her father. The Foundation supports horticultural and educational endeavors. Rachel Lambert Mellon (1910-2014) was a renowned collector, whose marriage to Paul Mellon in 1948, the only son of financier Andrew Mellon, united two of America’s most affluent families. Throughout her life, she pursued a love of gardening, both at her own homes as well for a number of friends, including Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, who asked her to redesign the White House Rose Garden in 1961. The Oak Spring Garden Library, Mrs. Mellon’s celebrated collection of rare books, manuscripts, works of art and artifacts relating to gardening, landscape design, horticulture, botany, natural history and travels, is world-renowned and among the finest of its kind. Passionate about art, Mr. and Mrs. Mellon built an extraordinary collection, while generously supporting the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. and establishing the Yale Center for British Art. Equally ardent about horses, the couple bred and raised race horses, including the 1993 Kentucky Derby winner, Sea Hero. Rothkos, Diebenkorns are presumed to be taken off the National Gallery rooms where they resided for decades due to the generous loan of collector in the cultural content of the nation, while jewelry by Cartier, Verdura, and other world renowned designers, along with French, English and American antique furniture, and rare porcelains items are the gossip these days in both sides of the Atlantic...