The Insider: inspiration from the interiors of Les Trois Garçons

If you've ever eaten at A-lister repository and east London restaurant, Les Trois Garçons, you'll recognise the style below. 

Even if you haven't (and it isn't cheap), the place is well-known for its interiors and a favourite with art directors and photographers, so you'll have almost certainly spotted it as the backdrop for countless glossy magazine shoot. Either way, feast your eyes...

Why read about it today? Because the auction house, Christie's, has just announced that it is selling off lots of the unusual decor in a sale next month. And not just eye-catching objets from the restaurant, but also bounty from the owners' French castle, La Chateau de la Goujonnerie, and from their London homes.

In all, there will be 380 lots and Christie's estimates prices between £500 and £80,000. Goodies up for grabs include this collection of late 20th-century decorative pineapples, estimated to sell for £800-£1200.

The owners Michel Lasserre, Hassan Abdullah, and Stefan Karlsson (aka "Les Trois Garçons"), run quite the aesthetic empire, which also includes their cocktail bar, Loungelover, a design shop café, Maison Trois Garçons, and L3G Design, the trio's interior design practice. "We love beautiful things – collecting is a compulsion," they say. And with Hassan having launched his own range of furniture, they say the auction is part of the process of "simplifying" their lives.

You may not be able to stretch to purchasing any of their exotic cast-offs, but shots of their interiors are marvellous inspiration for injecting a bit of humour and creative oddness into your own place. Don't you just love the insane Victorian taxidermic squirrels playing cards, below (guide price £2,000-£4,000)?

Or how about this for a grand hallway?

The unicorns are Lot 7 and estimated at around £4,000-£6,000.

Lot 75 is this striking 2005 Jonathan Wateridge painting, above, oil on nine layers of perspex bolted together (£50,000-£80,000). The Italian rosewood desk, designed by Paolo Buffa for Dassi in around 1950 and the bent plywood chair, by Vittorio Nobili, are Lot 74 and the set is estimated at around £2,500-£4,500.

The 1970s/80s panda table above is expected to sell for between £2,000 to £4,000.

Groups of the vases above will be going for around £500 to £2,000. The 1960s/70s French beaded-glass chandelier below is Lot 13, and is estimated to go for £5,000 to £8,000.

The auction catalogue is worth a voyeuristic flick-through. I particularly like the Orangery, a room with a plastic Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton (from £500) on the dining table, and a McDonald's "M" and huge metal sign on the wall reading "Cock" (from £1,500) hanging on the ancient stone walls. Well, if you can't have fun in your own castle...

The pieces are all also part of a pre-auction exhibition at Christie's, in London's South Kensington, which runs from Saturday 1 March until the eve of the sale, which is taking place on 5 March. Find out more at Christies.com

Post by Kate