Clocks, Watches & Jewellery

Through his numerous inventions, the Parisian craftsman Julien Leroy (1686-1759) is credited with revitalising the art of clock and watch making in the French capital and throughout the country.

An impressive Edwardian aquamarine and diamond brooch with a provenance to the first lady to take her seat as an MP in the UK sold for £54,000 (plus 25% buyer’s premium) at auction this month.

This early 18th century Louis XIV French table clock is part of a selection of 19 early European timekeepers that feature in Heritage Auctions’ fine and decorative arts sale in Dallas on March 8-10.

An 18th century pocket watch by Gibraltarian goldsmith Henry Cowper emerged for sale at Rowley’s auction house in Ely. It belonged to a Lincolnshire private collector who bought it over 50 years ago for £1 from a former resident of the Rock.

Two single-owner collections built up over lifetimes were well received at Canterbury Auction Galleries (20% buyer’s premium) on February 5-6.

Good times at the Oxford rooms of Mallams (20% buyer’s premium), when all bar one of 56 clocks got away almost all going comfortably above estimates.

A rich spread of American, European and Asian material is on offer at Thomaston Place’s latest Winter Weekend auction to be held over three days from March 1-3 in Thomaston, Maine.

Our weekly selection from salerooms and dealerships.

Given a surprising £200-300 estimate, a George IV brass and glass carriage clock was one of the stars of McTear’s (23% buyer’s premium) Glasgow sale on February 1.

After re-booting the moribund firm of Hutchinson Scott (20% buyer’s premium) in 2016, former dealers Michael Scott and Paul Hodson have now bought their premises at Embsay Mill at Skipton.

Among the more eagerly contested entries to the Woolley & Wallis (25% buyer’s premium) sale on January 24 was a late 19th century replica of the Alfred Jewel: the great example of Anglo-Saxon goldsmithing found in Somerset in 1693 and today one of the most popular exhibits at the Ashmolean Museum.

A selection of 10 stand-out jewellery lots offered at auction in February-April 2019.

A rare Longines centre seconds military wristwatch – a type developed in 1944 for the rigours of airborne work by the Research & Development team of the War Department – sold for a multi-estimate £11,200 at Barbara Kirk (15% buyer’s premium) in Penzance on November 27 last year.

A local family that could trace a clear line back to the 1750 was the consignor of this gold, white enamel and citrine mourning ring to Henry Adams in Chichester.

Deemed a little ostentatious in some circles, tiaras have enjoyed a surge in popularity in recent years, particularly in Russia and the Baltic states where jeans and a diamond fascinator are de rigueur at informal high-society events.

The rivière – one of the most popular and enduring styles of necklace to come out of the Georgian period – features an endless line of matched or subtly graduated gems set within inconspicuous collets.

The opening 96 lots of the sale at Skinner (23% buyer’s premium) in Boston on December 4 were from the stock of the former New York dealership Edith Weber Antique Jewelry.

Jean Ghika, global director of jewellery at Bonhams, closed out 2018 on a positive note.

Sapphires have been mined in Burma (now Myanmar) for over a millennium, the stones admired for their colour saturation and dark hues.