Important Modern & Vintage Timepieces

Hong - Kong, Oct 09, 2010

LOT 111

Christophe Claret Music Box No. 8, with Two Melodies Christophe Claret, Le Locle, No.8, Ref. MB 950. Made in the 2000s. Extremely fine and ingenious, water-resistant, 18K pink gold wristwatch with two-tune, visible cylinder music box movement playing either Strauss's "Imperial Waltz" or C. Chaplin's "Two Little Bootees" at will or on the hour, tune selection indication, music box power-reserve indication, special dual winding via a single crown and an 18K pink gold Christophe Claret buckle.

C. Three-body, polished, stepped shaped bezel and band, tune selection and passage/silence/command selection slides on the band, concave lugs, three-position crown for winding the music, going and handsetting, transparent back with 7 screws, sapphire crystals. D. 18K white gold, offset chapter ring with radial champlevé Roman numerals, outer dot minute divisions, engine-turned center, subsidiary seconds, tune indicator sector and music box power-reserve sector above, aperture for the music box governor between under a polished steel bridge. Blued steel spade hands. M. 32 mm., special caliber, rhodium-plated, fausses cotes decoration, 19 jewels, straight-line lever escapement, monometallic balance adjusted to five positons, self-compensating flat balance spring, shock absorber, swan-neck micrometer regulator. Music box: large barrel beneath a brushed pink gold cover in the form of a parchment engraved "Melodies, 1. J. Strauss, Imperial Waltz, 2. C. Chaplin, Two Little Bootees", pinned cylinder and steel comb with 20 tuned teeth. Dial and movement signed. Diam. 40 mm. Thickness 14 mm.