Lot Essay
With Patek Philippe Extract from the Archives confirming production of the present watch with enamel dial, dauphine numerals, gilt minute figures, light-grey enamel with platinum and diamonds decoration in 1910 and its subsequent sale on 26 October 1911.
Fresh to the market it is a fine example of one of Patek Philippe's filigree watches, distinguished by their delicately detailed and pierced diamond-set decoration.
Another example of such filigree decorated pendant watch, movement no. 158'340, is illustrated and described in Patek Philippe Museum - Patek Philippe Watches - Volume II, p. 104, Inv. P-1641.
Filigree (also less commonly spelled filagree, and formerly written filigrann or filigrene) is a delicate kind of jewellery metalwork, usually of gold and silver, made with tiny beads or twisted threads, or both in combination, soldered together or to the surface of an object of the same metal and arranged in artistic motifs. It often suggests lace and was particularly popular from the 17th to the late 19th centuries. The English word filigree (filigré in French) is shortened from the earlier use of filigreen which derives from Latin "filum" meaning thread and "granum" grain, in the sense of small bead. In the late 19th century, the celebrated master jeweller Peter Carl Fabergé revived the use of gold filigree, rendering it very popular during the Edwardian period. Clothing and jewellery then moved into a vibrant new era called Art Nouveau, the fashionable "passementerie" or laces and trims now reproduced in fine wires to embellish also jewellery and watches. Filigree decorated jewellery and watches reached the height of their popularity during the Art Deco period of the 1920s and 1930s. Difficult to create and painstakingly finished by hand, the romanticism and detail of antique filigree has made it widely popular up to the present day.
Fresh to the market it is a fine example of one of Patek Philippe's filigree watches, distinguished by their delicately detailed and pierced diamond-set decoration.
Another example of such filigree decorated pendant watch, movement no. 158'340, is illustrated and described in Patek Philippe Museum - Patek Philippe Watches - Volume II, p. 104, Inv. P-1641.
Filigree (also less commonly spelled filagree, and formerly written filigrann or filigrene) is a delicate kind of jewellery metalwork, usually of gold and silver, made with tiny beads or twisted threads, or both in combination, soldered together or to the surface of an object of the same metal and arranged in artistic motifs. It often suggests lace and was particularly popular from the 17th to the late 19th centuries. The English word filigree (filigré in French) is shortened from the earlier use of filigreen which derives from Latin "filum" meaning thread and "granum" grain, in the sense of small bead. In the late 19th century, the celebrated master jeweller Peter Carl Fabergé revived the use of gold filigree, rendering it very popular during the Edwardian period. Clothing and jewellery then moved into a vibrant new era called Art Nouveau, the fashionable "passementerie" or laces and trims now reproduced in fine wires to embellish also jewellery and watches. Filigree decorated jewellery and watches reached the height of their popularity during the Art Deco period of the 1920s and 1930s. Difficult to create and painstakingly finished by hand, the romanticism and detail of antique filigree has made it widely popular up to the present day.