• by Sarah Mahoney  @mahoney_sarah, July 8, 2025

 Photo Credit: Bonhams

With the premiere of “Downton Abbey 3” right around the corner -- and an enormous fan base looking for any way to escape 2025 -- Bonhams is offering fans a chance to own a piece of the long-running franchise.

Ever since the show’s debut in 2010, fans have been captivated by all things Crawley. With more than 120 million viewers worldwide, it is one of the most popular British TV exports ever, and the saga has riveted American fans, charmed by the exquisite, Julian Fellowes-produced interiors, elaborate period costumes, and the delicious sarcasm of the late Maggie Smith.

Before the public says “Cheerio” for good, Bonhams is set to cash in on all that fan devotion. Among the items: Lady Mary’s complete wedding ensemble, which the auction house expects to go for between  £3,000 and £5,000; the bell wall in the servant’s hall, £5,000 - £7,000, or Lady Sybil’s scandalous harem pants from season 1, £3,000  £5,000.

Low on funds? Consider a pair of white leather gloves, £100 – £150, worn by Thomas Barrow, who often proved that ambition, when paired with treachery, always finds a footman’s uniform.

First as a TV show, “Downton” racked up critical acclaim, broke viewing records for PBS and sparked a booming tourism market, with American fans making the pilgrimage to Highclere Castle in Hampshire, where the series was filmed. The franchise has also performed well in the first two movies, and producer Carnival Films expects the third in the trilogy to succeed similarly.

Carnival is contributing its proceeds to Together for Short Lives, the UK’s leading charity for children with life-limiting conditions. 

“From the opening shock of a sunk Titanic, through the First World War, with newly working women and their bitter struggle for votes; with, too, the simplification of men’s clothing (in the trenches for example, wrist watches replaced pocket watches) to a post-war world of fewer servants, embryonic workers’ rights, and technological advances from electricity and telephones to automobiles, aeroplanes, gramophones and sewing machines, Downton’s Crawley family adopted them all," writes costume historian Philippa Stockley in Bonhams Magazine.