Living Computers Museum + Labs, the Seattle institution created by the late Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen as a hands-on showcase for rare computing technology and interactive displays, will not reopen, more than four years after closing just ahead of the pandemic.
Allen’s estate, which has been managing and winding down his vast array of holdings since his death in 2018, confirmed that the 12-year-old museum is closed for good. The estate also announced that some key pieces from Allen’s personal collection of computer artifacts, displayed over the years at Living Computers, will be auctioned by Christie’s as part of a broader sale of various Allen items later this year.
As directed by Allen’s wishes, proceeds from the sale of any items will go to charitable causes. Allen’s sister Jody Allen is the executor of his estate and for several years has been selling pieces of it, ranging from Seattle’s Cinerama movie theater, the Everett, Wash.-based Flying Heritage and Combat Armor Museum, Vulcan Productions, Stratolaunch, the superyacht Octopus, and more.
The estate previously teamed with Christie’s for a November 2022 auction of 155 masterpieces from Allen’s extensive art collection. It was the world’s most successful single-owner fine art auction ever, raising a record $1.62 billion.
The new auction, titled “Gen One: Innovations from the Paul G. Allen Collection,” is billed as “a celebration of first-generation technologies and the pioneering minds behind them.”
The event will feature more than 150 items in three separate auctions, including “Firsts: The History of Computing,” an online sale closing Sept. 12. This auction pays homage to Allen’s role shaping the modern computing landscape. A highlight of the sale is a computer which Allen helped restore and on which he worked, a DEC PDP-10: KI-10. Built in 1971, it’s the first computer that both Allen and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates ever used prior to founding Microsoft. It’s estimated to fetch $30,000 to $50,000.
Christie’s said details about other computers and related items from Allen’s collection will be shared this summer.
The other two auctions of Allen property include “Pushing Boundaries: Ingenuity,” a live auction on Sept. 10 that will feature items intended to tell the story of scientific and technological achievements.
