The Carnegie Club at Skibo Castle which features an 18-hole championship golf course, 21 castle rooms, 12 estate lodges, a luxury spa, a glass-roofed pool house, a French clay tennis court and 8,000 acres of hills, woodland and fishing lochs sits on the banks of the Dornoch Firth and provides its 400 members breath-taking views of the surrounding landscape and activities ranging from game and clay pigeon shooting to falconry. Belonging to the Carnegie Club offers members access to one of the world’s most extraordinary and luxurious residential clubs.

Skibo Castle was originally the home of one of the world’s first millionaires, industrialist and philanthropist, Andrew Carnegie. Carnegie was born in Dunfermline but immigrated to the United States with his family as a boy. He made his money from investments in railroads and building Pittsburgh’s Carnegie Steel Company which eventually became the U.S Steel Corporation. After selling Carnegie Steel, he became the richest man in America for several years, even surpassing John D. Rockefeller for the title.

From then on, Carnegie devoted the remainder of his life to using his fortune for large-scale philanthropic endeavours with particular emphasis on education, world peace, scientific research and public libraries. In fact, he established 3,000 public libraries throughout the United States, Britain, Canada and other English-speaking countries, built Carnegie Hall in New York and the Peace Palace in The Hague as well as founding the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Carnegie Institute for Science, Carnegie Trust for the Universities of Scotland, Carnegie Hero fund and Carnegie Mellon University among other trusts and organisations. It’s estimated that in the last 18 years of his life Carnegie gave away almost 90% of his fortune to charities, foundations and universities, equating to about $5.15 billion in 2019 dollars.

In 1898, Carnegie bought Skibo Castle to establish his Scottish roots and leave a legacy for his daughter, Margaret. No expense was spared in transforming the run-down country estate into a millionaire’s playground to create in Carnegie’s own words a “Heaven on Earth” experience. It stayed in the Carnegie family until the early 1980s and is now privately owned and operated as The Carnegie Club by Eve and Ellis Short, who over the last 16 years have taken the club from strength to strength.

Considering the majority of the club’s members are from Europe and the United States, AUTHOR wanted to provide a collection for discerning travellers who appreciate the best of British design, allowing them to take a keepsake home to evoke memories of their time spent in Scotland at the esteemed club and castle.

All of the pieces in the Travellers’ Collection, which range from silverware to gilded ceramics, have been hand crafted from the finest materials by makers across the British Isles. These pieces have been made with sustainability in mind, focusing on slow design and responsible luxury. At AUTHOR, we champion the finest British design and deny the vagaries of fads and fast fashion. We want clients to change the way they think about what they put in their home and help us support British artisanal makers with a slower, more ethical approach to design, continuing to create beautiful pieces to the highest quality. These pieces are made to such a standard of detail and excellence that they are designed to last and be future heirlooms for families to enjoy for generations to come.

We at AUTHOR have an open and transparent relationship with our makers, ensuring that they are treated honestly and fairly. The quote from Andrew Carnegie himself that, “teamwork is the ability to work together toward a common vision,” resonates with AUTHOR and our quest to advocate a more conscious approach to purchasing and reduce the harmful impact mass production has on society and the environment.

The collection features pieces such as cabinetmaker Hugh Parsons’ Cribbage Board, hand crafted from the most beautiful rippled sycamore and walnut wood, with a lacquer finish and 24 carat gold plated components in Hugh’s Edinburgh workshop, the delightfully individual silver bottle stoppers, wine pourers and brooches based on animals, British nursery rhymes and myths of Edinburgh-based silversmith Bryony Knox and the stunning watch boxes and cigar humidors handmade by the skilled team at Dovedale Design Studios in London made from thousands of year-old solid Bog Oak and elegant brass joints which can be ordered for direct delivery to members’ homes if they don’t have enough room to fit it into their suitcase.

These pieces epitomise AUTHOR’s ethos of buying less with more consideration, a philosophy we believe the members of the acclaimed Carnegie Club will humbly agree with. We are honoured to have these distinctive and luxury pieces on display and available for purchase at such a fittingly respected and impressive setting.