When we misplaced Freddie Mercury in 1991 he was in a long-term relationship with Jim Hutton, who he met in 1985.

Yet he left his West London mansion and all his possessions, in addition to his wealth and the lion's share of all his future earnings from Queen, to his former girlfriend.

Despite calls over time for Garden Lodge and its contents to be become a museum for followers, Mary has at all times maintained the strictest privateness over her personal life and Freddie's house – solely not often explaining why.

22 years later, Mary has determined to place all the things up for public sale at Sotheby's. 

Many of the virtually 1,500 objects are on show without cost to the general public on the public sale home on Bond Street till September 5. Scroll right down to see photos from the exhibition. 

The Freddie Mercury: A World Of His Own exhibition contains his prized Yamaha child grand piano (valued at £2-3million), on which he composed so many iconic songs, and lots of stage costumes and hand-written tune lyrics.

But it additionally paints a vivid image of the star's house life, away from the sunshine. His in depth and spectacular artwork assortment is displayed alongside quite a few private cat collectible figurines, tributes to his beloved feline mates.

Fans can wander amongst sofas and backyard furnishings, desk settings and his moustache comb. There's even the closely graffitied backyard door.

So why did the Queen legend depart all the things to a girl he hadn't dated for 16 years, as a substitute of his companion, band mates or household?

The key lay in who Freddie was at house, the true man behind the showman.

He as soon as stated: "You can be loved by so many thousands of people but still be the loneliest person. And the frustration of that makes it worse because it's hard for people to understand that you can be lonely.

"Can you think about how horrible it's if you've acquired all the things, however you are still desperately lonely? That is terrible past phrases."

"I can solely identify one actually expensive one who I can really speak in confidence to and really feel actually proud of."

Freddie said: "I may need all the issue on the earth, however I've Mary and that will get me by."

And that love and bond between them never wavered, from early days in their tiny Shepherds Bush flat before Queen was famous, to his opulent West Kensingtom mansion.

He once said: "There have solely been two people who've given again as a lot like to me as I gave to them: Mary, with whom I had a protracted affair, and our cat, Jerry. My bond with Mary appears to develop and develop."

That never changed, even as other relationships and cats came and went.

Mary remained his best friend and also took over much of the running of Garden Lodge. And she was part of the small core group who cared for Freddie around the clock in his final months.

The star once declared of their lifelong love: "If I am going first, I'm going to go away all the things to her. Nobody else will get a penny, besides my cats."

When Freddie realised he was very sick and that his HIV was progressing to full-blown AIDS, he sat Mary down to explain his intentions.

Mary tried to persuade Freddie against leaving her everything, but she revealed he told her: "If issues had been completely different, you'd have been my spouse and this is able to have been yours anyway."