Updated

Updated · bbc.co.uk · Jul 7

Alan Carr Keeps Unsold Concrete Cow as Ayton Castle Auction Raises About £100,000

Updated

Updated · bbc.co.uk · Jul 7

Alan Carr Keeps Unsold Concrete Cow as Ayton Castle Auction Raises About £100,000

Q: Why did a comedian auction centuries of castle history, only to save a single, unwanted concrete cow?

He auctioned the items because they were not part of what he wanted to keep when he bought Ayton Castle; he kept the concrete cow only because nobody else wanted it. Carr bought the 19th-century Ayton Castle in February 2026 and, with the agreement of the previous owners, put the estate’s “residual contents” up for sale. The auction covered hundreds of unwanted objects left in the castle, from furniture and paintings to textiles and vehicles. In practical terms, it was a clear-out tied to a major renovation of the 17-bedroom property, a project that is also being filmed for his Disney+ series *Castle Man*. The sale was commercially successful. More than 400 items across roughly 460 to 499 lots were offered, raising about £137,000 overall, with around £100,000 expected to go to the former owners. The top lot was a Bentley Mulsanne sold for £24,000. A major draw was the Branxton Cement Menagerie, a folk-art collection of painted concrete figures created in the 1960s by retired joiner John Fairnington, which brought in about £28,000 in total. The concrete cow was not a symbolic choice over “centuries of history.” It was simply the only lot that failed to attract a bid after seven-and-a-half hours of selling. Auctioneer Jim Railton said it was the sole unsold item. Carr decided to keep it as an ornament and memento of the menagerie that had briefly been housed at Ayton Castle.

3 articles · Updated · bbc.co.uk · Jul 7

One lot out of hundreds failed to sell at Sunday’s Ayton Castle auction — a concrete cow sculpture that Alan Carr is now set to keep as a memento.
Seven-and-a-half hours of selling produced only that single unsold item, auctioneer Jim Railton said, with the sale expected to raise about £100,000 for the former castle owners.
£24,000 was the top price, paid for a five-seater Bentley Mulsanne, while the Branxton Cement Menagerie sculptures fetched about £28,000 overall.
Carr bought Ayton Castle in the Scottish Borders earlier this year, and the auction cleared residual contents unwanted by both him and the previous owners.