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A silver Montblanc fountain pen once owned by Singapore’s founding leader, Lee Kuan Yew, has sold for around US$360,000 in an online auction, easily beating initial expectations after a fierce bidding battle. The piece headlined the August fine art sale by Singaporean auction house Hotlotz, drawing strong interest from collectors chasing rare political memorabilia.
The instrument is a vintage Meisterstück No. 146 piston-filler, sporting a sterling silver body, gold-plated trim, and an 18k gold nib. The big draw, though, is the custom engraving: "SM Lee Kuan Yew." That small detail ties the pen straight to his time as Senior Minister between 1990 and 2004, the chapter right after his three decades as prime minister.
It isn’t the first time the pen has changed hands. It originally popped up on the secondary market back in 2003 at a Sotheby’s charity sale of Lee family items, where it had a modest guide price under S$6,000. For this latest sale, Hotlotz had estimated it between S$30,000 and S$50,000 (about US$23,000 to US$39,000). The final hammer price blew past those numbers by nearly ten times, proving just how much demand there is for authentic pieces of Lee’s legacy.
Lee, who passed away in 2015 at 91, remains one of the most influential figures in modern Asian history. Because his personal belongings almost never surface for public sale, opportunities like this tend to spark intense bidding wars. The auction also included notable artworks by Singaporean masters, featuring pieces by Chen Wen Hsi, Chua Mia Tee, and ceramic artist Iskandar Jalil.