A rare Lego piece found at a Goodwill store was purchased for nearly $20,000 in an online auction.
The Bionicle Golden Kanohi Hau mask, manufactured in 2001, was found by employees inside a branch of a nonprofit store in DuBois, Pennsylvania.
The 14-karat gold Lego mask weighed 26.14 grams and was one of 30 such pieces made at the time.
The mask had been listed for a base price of just $14.95 on Buy goodwill but upon its discovery, the rare item had previously been bid for a whopping $33,000.
The Bionicle Golden Kanohi Hau mask, manufactured in 2001, was found by employees inside a branch of the nonprofit store in DuBois, Pennsylvania.
Weighing 26.14 grams, the 14-karat gold Lego mask was one of 30 such pieces made at the time.
The mask had been listed for a base price of just $14.95 at Shop Goodwill, but following its discovery, the rare item was previously bid on for a whopping $33,000.
Chad Smith, vice president of e-commerce and technology at Goodwill, said WTAJ: ‘There are 30 of the gold ones. They make some of silver and others of platinum.
‘We’ve been talking about it all week. I haven’t really even had a chance to think about it, but it’s pretty amazing.
“It just goes to show that you never know what you’re going to find at shopgoodwill.com.”
Some of the 30 pieces were gifted to LEGO employees and the rest were awarded through a competition in 2001.
The mask is part of Lego’s Bionicle collection and, according to the toy manufacturer, the collection has inspired “a large number of interconnected media, including books, films, television series, comics, video games and other licensed products” among 2001 and the original end of the line in 2010.
Some of the 30 pieces were given to LEGO employees and the rest were awarded through a competition in 2001.
The mask is part of Lego’s Bionicle collection and, according to the toy manufacturer, the collection has inspired “a large number of interconnected media, including books, films, television series, comics, video games and other licensed products” among 2001 and the original end of the line in 2010
But despite its enormous popularity, Goodwill store workers didn’t recognize the mask.
‘A combination of the words ‘biological chronicle’, the BIONICLE line featured characters that were a combination of mechanical and organic elements. The line turned out to be a cultural phenomenon, enriched by a long history about the Matoran universe that reached far beyond the toys themselves,’ as described LEGO.
But despite its enormous popularity, Goodwill store workers didn’t recognize the mask.
Jessica Illuzzi, public relations and social media coordinator for Goodwill Industries of North Central Pennsylvania, said, ‘We didn’t know what we had when we found it. It came in a box full of random jewelry from the State College store. So it had already been processed through donations there.
‘I think it’s really cool that there are so few of them, but it’s also cool to find out the research behind it. And then the final step is finding the right collector to actually take it for once.’
This discovery comes two months after a Virginia woman purchasing a vase at her local Goodwill store unknowingly led her to find one of the rarest works of Italian art.
Jessica Vincent, 43, was browsing her local Goodwill when a 13-inch Murano glass vase wrapped in brush strokes of burgundy and green caught her eye.
He suspected there was something special about it and made a purchase for $3.99.
Jessica Vincent, 43, was browsing her local Goodwill when she found a 13-inch Murano glass vase wrapped in brush strokes of burgundy and green and purchased it for $3.99.
The piece was estimated to sell for between $30,000 and $50,000 when it went up for auction on December 13, but instead sold for $107,100.
‘It was so unusual. It had so much quality. “I knew it was a nice piece of glass with the mark on the bottom,” he said. “I knew he would come home to me.”
After some research once he got home, Vincent was surprised to learn that the piece was a 1940s design by influential Venetian architect Carlo Scarpa, part of the Pennellate series he designed for Venini, a centuries-old glass workshop. on the island of Murano.
In an effort to learn more, Murano posted a photo of the vase to a Facebook group and became even more excited by the responses.
The members rushed to help her identify the rare item; some even started offering money to buy it.
One member even offered her $10,000 for the vase, but she declined; others suggested contacting the Wright Auction House in New York.
The piece was estimated to fetch between $30,000 and $50,000 when it went up for auction on December 13, but instead sold for $107,100.
In July 2023, a Kentucky man struck gold after discovering more than 700 rare gold dollars buried on his farm in what experts have called the “Great Kentucky Treasure.”
Pictured is one of the coins in the collection, a $20 Gold Liberty from 1863. The piece typically fetches a six-figure sum at auction.
The unidentified man filmed himself digging up the loot, all minted between 1840 and 1863, while exclaiming: “This is the craziest thing ever.” In the photo: the complete collection.
The unidentified individual filmed himself digging up the loot, all minted between 1840 and 1863, while exclaiming, “This is the craziest thing ever.”
One of the coins discovered, an 1863 $20 Gold Liberty, could fetch up to six figures at auction, according to experts from GovernorMint saying. The collection features 18 of these ultra-rare pieces.
This means that if each of them owns at least $100,000, the owner could receive a payday of $1.8 million. And that’s not counting the hundreds of other rare coins in the collection.
Archaeologists speculate that the “treasure” belonged to wealthy Kentuckians in the 1860s, who buried huge sums of money to protect it from a Confederate raid during the American Civil War.
The coins were verified by Numismatic Guaranty Co. (NGC), who rated them as being in “extremely good to perfect condition.”
It’s unclear exactly where the land is located, but it supposedly belongs to the man who dug them up, according to Living science.
Experts estimate that 95 percent of the treasure is made up of gold dollars, including $1 Gold Indians, $10 Gold Libertys and $20 Gold Libertys.
The coins are believed to be related to the Civil War, when many people hoarded their money due to the rise of outlaws, smugglers and gangsters.
The identity of the person who purchased the Bionicle Golden Kanohi Hau mask is currently unknown.