ADVISORY SCOPE
WHO IS AEVUM OFFICE FOR?
Aevum Office works with single family offices (SFOs), multi-family offices (MFOs), UHNW families, private collectors, trustees, fiduciaries, wealth advisors, estate advisors, and professional teams responsible for art collections or cultural assets.
We support families and advisors who require a specialist layer of representation and oversight across acquisitions, sales, collection assessment, market intelligence, stewardship, legacy planning, institutional relationships, and cultural positioning.
Aevum Office is designed for clients who hold or are inheriting, building, or reassessing significant collections, and who believe art should be managed with the same strategic discipline as any other major holding.
WHAT DOES ‘INTEGRATED ART DEPARTMENT’ MEAN?
An integrated art department is a dedicated advisory and management function within, or alongside, a family office.
For some clients, this begins with a strategic review of an existing collection. For others, it means ongoing representation, acquisition support, deaccession strategy, stewardship, documentation, institutional engagement, private cultural access, or the development of a clearer long-term collecting mandate.
The role is flexible, but the principle is consistent: Aevum Office brings specialist art market, curatorial, operational, and strategic expertise into the family office environment.
We do not sit outside the family’s advisory structure. We work as part of it.
HOW DOES AEVUM OFFICE WORK WITH EXISTING ADVISORS?
Aevum Office works alongside the family’s existing office, trustees, investment advisors, lawyers, tax advisors, estate planners, insurers, and other specialist professionals.
We help families and advisors make better-informed decisions about the purpose, value, risk, care, visibility, and future direction of a collection.
Where required, we coordinate with qualified valuers, legal advisors, tax specialists, insurers, registrars, conservators, shippers, storage providers, galleries, auction houses, and other relevant partners. Our role is to provide the specialist art advisory layer that allows art-related decisions to be considered in relation to the wider family office structure.
WHAT KINDS OF COLLECTIONS DOES AEVUM OFFICE SUPPORT?
Aevum Office supports international collections spanning art, design, heritage objects, and evolving forms of collecting.
This may include painting, sculpture, installations and site-specific works, photography, digital, film, and new media, prints, editions, works on paper, rare books, archives, ephemera, antiquities, heritage objects, decorative arts, couture, textiles, design objects, furniture, fine jewellery, watches, collector automobiles, and other rare or culturally-significant objects.
We work across primary, secondary, and private markets, and across established and emerging collecting categories.
WHAT IS A COLLECTION MANDATE?
A collection mandate is the strategic framework that defines how a family’s collection should be understood, managed, developed, and positioned over time.
It may address financial objectives, cultural value, family identity, legacy, liquidity, visibility, governance, next-generation engagement, philanthropic ambitions, and the personal and aesthetic dimensions of collecting.
A mandate helps establish what belongs in the collection, what does not, what should be acquired, what may need to be sold, what requires further care or documentation, and how the collection should evolve across generations.
WHAT SERVICES DOES AEVUM OFFICE PROVIDE?
Aevum Office works across six core service areas:
Collection assessment
Advisory
Transactions
Stewardship
Positioning
Cultural experiences
These services are structured as a first-phase collection assessment and an annual advisory retainer, alongside performance-based transaction support and/or project-based work, depending on the client’s needs and the scale and complexity of the collection.
WHAT IS COLLECTION ASSESSMENT?
Collection assessment is the first phase of every engagement.
We review the collection, its history, current structures, documentation, market position, risks, opportunities, and future potential. From there, we develop a collection mandate, wider strategic framework, and proposed scope of engagement aligned with the family’s long-term objectives and governance structures.
Collection assessment gives the family and its advisors a clearer view of what they own, what it requires, where value may sit, where risk may exist, and what level of support is needed.
WHAT DOES AEVUM OFFICE PROVIDE THROUGH ADVISORY?
Aevum Office provides long-term representation and strategic advisory for the collection and the family’s broader art interests.
Following collection assessment, advisory is structured through an annual retainer. This gives the family office an ongoing specialist partner for market intelligence, acquisition review, opportunity assessment, reporting, relationship management, and strategic guidance over time.
Advisory is the core ‘in your corner’ service: a retained relationship through which Aevum Office enables the family to make informed, consistent, and well-positioned decisions across the art market.
DOES AEVUM OFFICE ADVISE ON ACQUISITIONS?
Yes. Aevum Office supports acquisition strategy, sourcing, market context, due diligence coordination, negotiation, and post-acquisition planning.
We help families and advisors understand not only whether a work is desirable, but whether it belongs within the collection’s mandate, value profile, risk position, and long-term direction.
This includes access to primary, secondary, and private market opportunities and intelligence, artist and gallery relationships, appraisals and valuations, condition reporting, and provenance.
DOES AEVUM OFFICE SUPPORT TRANSACTIONS?
Yes. Aevum Office supports transactions across primary, secondary, and private markets.
This includes acquisitions, divestments, negotiations, due diligence coordination, and transactional oversight.
Transaction support is structured on a performance fee basis. The precise structure depends on the nature of the transaction, the market context, and the scope of Aevum Office’s role.
DOES AEVUM OFFICE PROVIDE VALUATION OR TAX ADVICE?
Yes. Aevum Office works alongside your investment, legal, tax, estate advisors, and trustees, as well as providing assessments and advice from qualified specialists. We help a family or office understand what advice is needed, when it is needed, and how it should inform the wider collection strategy.
DOES AEVUM OFFICE ADVISE ON SELLING OR REBALANCING A COLLECTION?
Yes. Aevum Office advises on rebalancing, divestment, deaccession strategy, and sale preparation.
This may include identifying works that no longer serve the collection’s mandate, assessing market timing, coordinating valuations, reviewing sale routes, supporting conversations with auction houses, galleries, and private dealers, advising on how a sale may affect the collection’s wider market position, and logistics.
Selling is treated strategically, not simply transactionally. We consider liquidity, timing, reputation, relationships, visibility, tax and estate implications where relevant, and the future shape of the collection.
WHAT IS STEWARDSHIP?
Stewardship is the operational oversight of a collection over time.
Aevum Office works alongside the family office and specialist partners to maintain continuity, visibility, and control across the collection. This includes cloud-based collection management, documentation, cataloguing, conservation coordination, storage review, insurance coordination, shipping, installation, condition reporting, loan management, and wider operational planning.
Stewardship is structured on a project fee basis, depending on the scale, geography, condition, and complexity of the collection.
WHAT IS POSITIONING?
Positioning concerns how a collection is experienced, understood, remembered, and valued.
Aevum Office supports projects that strengthen the visibility, content, cultural significance, and long-term position of a collection. This includes publishing, exhibitions, digital initiatives, institutional partnerships, museum loans, commissions, archives, research, cultural programming, philanthropic initiatives, and public or private storytelling around the collection.
WHAT ARE CULTURAL EXPERIENCES?
Aevum Office facilitates private cultural programmes shaped around a family’s collection, interests, geography, and mandate.
This includes access to international art fairs, biennials, exhibitions, and artist studios, including previews and vernissage events, studio visits, artist and curator introductions, private events, institutional briefings, and tailored cultural itineraries.
These programmes support next-generation engagement, family education, acquisition strategy, patronage, institutional relationships, and broader cultural participation.
DOES AEVUM OFFICE WORK WITH NEXT-GENERATION FAMILY MEMBERS?
Yes. Aevum Office supports next-generation principals who are beginning to define their own relationship to art, collecting, patronage, cultural experience, and family assets.
This includes education, advisory conversations, collection visits, artist and curator introductions, institutional access, acquisition support, travel programmes, and the development of independent cultural projects.
We help next-generation family members understand art not only as a personal interest, but as a field of value, responsibility, access, and long-term family significance.
DOES AEVUM OFFICE SUPPORT ESTATE, SUCCESSION, AND LEGACY PLANNING?
Yes. Aevum Office supports families and advisors thinking through the future of a collection across generations.
This includes collection purpose, family governance, next-generation engagement, documentation, institutional relationships, gifts and loans, archive development, privacy, visibility, philanthropic strategy, and long-term stewardship.
We help translate a collection from a group of assets into a considered cultural and family legacy.
DOES AEVUM OFFICE PROVIDE VALUATION, LEGAL, TAX, OR INVESTMENT ADVICE?
Aevum Office is not a law firm, tax advisor, insurer, or regulated investment advisor.
We do not replace a family’s existing legal, tax, investment, fiduciary, or insurance advisors. Instead, we work alongside them, helping families and offices identify what specialist input is needed, when it is needed, and how it should inform the wider collection strategy.
Where valuation, tax, legal, insurance, conservation, or other technical advice is required, we coordinate with a trusted global network of specialist partners.
IS AEVUM OFFICE INDEPENDENT?
Yes. Aevum Office operates independently from external commissions and incentives.
Our engagement is built on long-term alignment with the family and its mandate. Where third-party fees, incentives, or conflicts are offered, these are disclosed and passed through to the client.
The purpose of our model is to provide families and advisors with independent representation, informed access, and clear strategic oversight across the global art market.
HOW IS AEVUM OFFICE PRICED?
Aevum Office offers flexible engagement structures priced around the client’s needs, collection size, and complexity.
Engagements are generally structured around four tiers: Establishing, Core, Premier, and Bespoke.
Each tier is built from the same underlying model:
A one-time collection assessment
Advisory through an annual retainer
Transactions through performance-based fees
Stewardship, positioning, and cultural experiences through project fees
This structure allows Aevum Office to provide a clear retained advisory relationship while pricing additional work according to the nature, scale, and complexity of the services required.
HOW DO ENGAGEMENTS BEGIN?
Every engagement begins with a complimentary consultation.
We first establish the family’s existing structures, collection history, priorities, sensitivities, and desired level of involvement.
From there, Aevum Office conducts a collection assessment to determine what level of advisory, transaction, stewardship, positioning, or cultural experience support is appropriate and recommended.
The aim is to understand the collection, family, advisors, and mandate, and to build the right structure around them.
DOES AEVUM OFFICE WORK INTERNATIONALLY?
Yes. Aevum Office works internationally, with experience across major wealth and cultural hubs including London, New York, Sydney, Hong Kong, Zürich, Singapore, Saudi Arabia, and the wider Middle East and Asia-Pacific region.
Our work is relationship-led and context-specific. We build around the client’s existing structures, geography, collection, family priorities, and desired level of visibility.
Aevum Office’s networks span collectors, advisors, institutions, galleries, auction houses, artists, curators, and specialist partners across the global art market.
IS AEVUM OFFICE’S WORK PUBLIC-FACING?
Usually not. Most of Aevum Office’s work is private and discreet.
Some projects may have a public dimension where appropriate, particularly around museum loans, patronage, institutional partnerships, commissions, philanthropy, publishing, exhibitions, and cultural programming.
Public visibility is always at the client’s discretion.
WHAT IS THE VALUE OF WORKING WITH AEVUM OFFICE?
Aevum Office gives families and their advisors a clearer view of what they own, why it matters, what it requires, and what it could become.
We help collections move from accumulation to intention: from objects held privately to assets understood strategically, cared for properly, and positioned in relation to value, purpose, legacy, and future use.
For families, this means greater clarity, control, access, and confidence.
For advisors, it means a specialist art partner who can operate inside the family office structure and support better decision-making across a complex, relationship-driven, and often opaque global art market.