Antiquorum Auctioneers since 1974

Geneva, Nov 08, 2026

LOT 418

BOUVIER FRÈRES, SWITZERLAND, POCKET WATCH WITH “WANDERING” AUTOMATA, 18K YELLOW GOLD AND ENAMEL

CHF 10,000 - 20,000

HKD 96,000 - 192,000 / USD 12,200 - 24,300 / EUR 10,800 - 21,600 / JPY 1,920,000 - 3,840,000

Sold: CHF 12,600

A very fine and rare, 18k gold and enamel, "wandering automaton" pocket watch double-face, open-face, key-winding pocket watch with “wandering” automata visible through an aperture at 12 o’clock. White enamel dial with an eccentric time dial in the lower section, featuring Breguet numerals, and fast-and-slow regulation above; Breguet hands. Fausse-plaque finely decorated with polychrome champlevé enamel on a red ground, depicting flowers and foliage. Above, within a semi-circular aperture, a series of gold automata figures, driven by the going train, revolve like a carousel, depicting a hunting scene with dogs, hunters and deer, completing one rotation every minute.

Facebook LinkedIn

LOADING IMAGES
Click to full view Click to full view
Image Image
Grading System
Grade: AAA

Excellent
Case: 3-24

Good

Slightly chipped
Movement: 3*

Good

Overhaul recommended, at buyer's expense
Dial: 3-71-72-04

Good

ENAMEL AND VARIOUS TYPES OF DECORATION Hairlines

ENAMEL AND VARIOUS TYPES OF DECORATION Chipped winding aperture

HANDS Later

Brand BOUVIER FRÈRES, Switzerland

Year Circa 1795

Caliber 43 mm., full plate gilt brass movement with cylindrical pillars, fusee and chain, verge escapement with plain brass three armed balance.

Diameter 50 mm.

Signature Dial

Notes

Bouvier, Geneva
Bouvier Frères (probably Jacques and David) are well known for their high-quality double-face watches with “wandering” automata, made at the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries for the English and French markets but also for the Chinese market.
From their workshop, a much more complicated watch is listed (double- face with two-train) fitted with three motion automatons (Sotheby’s, New York, auction, December 6, 2011, lot 110, sold for the amount of US$ 98 500.-).
These watchmakers come from a family from the Pays de Gex (French region close to Geneva). One of their brothers or cousins is the famous and talented painter Pierre-Louis Bouvier (1765-1836), specialist in miniature portraits painted on enamel or oil, inventor of a machine to grind pigments (machine approved by the Institut de France in Paris).

Very few watches of this type, fitted in a “Directoire”-shaped gold
case, are known to exist. They are signed by the horlogers-marchants (watchmakers and merchants), Bouvier Frères (Brothers) and by Chevalier & Cochet, both associations from Geneva. These watches exist with visible balance and / or fast-and-slow regulation.

The Patek Philippe Museum in Geneva kept in its collection few examples signed by Bouvier Frères:
• No. 6 389 (Inv. S-213; on this one, the figures wandering and swivelling on themselves);
• No. 7 066 (Inv. S-666; this one unsigned), a later one, circa 1800- 1805, in Retour d’Egypte (Egyptian Revival) Empire-style (illustrated
by Chapuis, Alfred, & Gélis, Edouard, Le monde des automates, étude historique et technique, Paris, Neuchâtel, 1928, vol. II, p. 71, ill. 357).
• No. 6 129 (Inv. S-211);
• No. 6 589 (Inv. S-212);