Pivotal Pair: Steve Jobs’ ‘Heavily Used’ Suede Birkenstocks Sells for Almost $220,000 in Auction - Uncategorized

The pair was initially owned by Mark Sheff, the house manager to the Apple founder.

Julien’s Auctions has sold a pair of Birkenstock once owned and heavily used by the late Steve Jobs. The suede footwear went for $218,750—the highest price ever paid for sandals, per the auction house. Its pre-sale estimate was only $60,000 to $80,000, and it received 19 bids. 

READ ALSO: The Day That Music Lived: Concert Poster Sets Auction Record At Nearly $500,000

Interestingly, the Birkenstocks were initially owned by Mark Sheff, the house manager to the Apple founder. Jobs’ net worth was approximately $10 billion at the time of his death in 2011. However, Sheff told Business Insider that he only kept “very few things.” 

Jobs’ “heavily used” Birkekstocks / Image from @juliens_auctions on Instagram.

“We kept some, shared some with the landscapers and friends, and brought some to Goodwill,” he added. “The collection we ended up with is quite random.”

Per Julien’s, Jobs wore the sandals during Apple’s defining moments through the 1970s to 1980s. In 1976, the industrial designer and business magnate started the development of Apple computers in a Los Altos garage with co-founder Steve Wozniak. 

The pair has been exhibited globally, from Salone del Mobile in Milan and IMM Koln in Cologne last 2017. A year prior, they were displayed in Birkenstocks’ first United States store in New York and Die Zeit Event in Berlin.

Banner image from Wikimedia Commons.

Shop for LIFESTYLE ASIA’S magazines through these platforms.
Download LIFESTYLE ASIA’s digital magazines from:
Subscribe via [email protected]