.jpg?w=1)
Lot Essay
The present watch is fitted with Adolphe Nicole's patented keyless winding system, Patent No. 10,348 of October 1844, the first commercially successful keyless work for both going-barrel and fusée watches.
Nicole Nielsen
The ébauche and the case of the present watch were supplied by Nicole, Nielsen & Co., who towards the end of the Victorian era and for the first 30 years of the 20th Century crafted some of the finest and most complicated English watches ever made.
In 1839, Adolphe Nicole and Jules Capt, both talented Swiss watchmakers, set up business in London at 80B Dean Street. Nicole & Capt were highly successful and won medals in many international exhibitions. In 1876 Jules Capt died and in the same year his place as partner was filled by the Danish-born watchmaker Sophus Emil Nielsen and the company became Nicole, Nielsen & Co. By 1880, the firm was being run by Nielsen. They specialized in the manufacture of super-complicated keyless watches incorporating features such as perpetual calendar, chronograph, split seconds chronograph, repeating, grande and petite sonnerie, temperature, equation of time as well as their most famous escapement, the Nicole Nielsen tourbillon.
Many of their best watches were made for the leading English retailers, notably Dent & Co.
Nicole Nielsen
The ébauche and the case of the present watch were supplied by Nicole, Nielsen & Co., who towards the end of the Victorian era and for the first 30 years of the 20th Century crafted some of the finest and most complicated English watches ever made.
In 1839, Adolphe Nicole and Jules Capt, both talented Swiss watchmakers, set up business in London at 80B Dean Street. Nicole & Capt were highly successful and won medals in many international exhibitions. In 1876 Jules Capt died and in the same year his place as partner was filled by the Danish-born watchmaker Sophus Emil Nielsen and the company became Nicole, Nielsen & Co. By 1880, the firm was being run by Nielsen. They specialized in the manufacture of super-complicated keyless watches incorporating features such as perpetual calendar, chronograph, split seconds chronograph, repeating, grande and petite sonnerie, temperature, equation of time as well as their most famous escapement, the Nicole Nielsen tourbillon.
Many of their best watches were made for the leading English retailers, notably Dent & Co.