Lot 328

Louis Audemars à Brassus

A very fine, heavy Swiss precision pocket watch - lever chronometer - with full calendar and moon phase

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The accompanying extract from the register shows that the pocket watch with the case number 9614 is recorded on page 115 of a stock list dated 31st December 1865 when it was in the workshop of Georges Reymond, one of Louis Audemars' outworkers. The watch appears to have been complete on that date but had not yet been returned to the main factory at the Crêt Meylan (Le Brassus). 9614 is described as stem wound, 19''' lignes diameter (approx. 42,75 mm), calendar, moon age and phase. The stock value of the watch was 820 Swiss Francs on that date.
This exquisite pocket watch has a white enamel dial with Roman hours and three subsidiary dials for day, date as well as auxiliary seconds with a cobalt blue enamel moon phase disc with inlaid golden stars and moon. The month is displayed in a small window under the "12". The beautifully executed movement features wolfteeth winding wheels, a pink gold train and a special counterpoised lever.

The company "Louis Audemars" was founded in 1811 in Le Brassus in the Jura Valley by Louis Audemars supported by his brother-in-law Meylan (after Meylan had started a cooperation with Isaac Piguet in Geneva - which would later be the famous company Piguet et Meylan). Louis Audemars married his first wife Julie LeCoultre and laid the foundation for the close friendship between the two companies. He had 15 children; three of them died, 4 daughters and 8 sons remained. The company specialized on the creation of ébauches but eventually began taking over the finishing work as well. Design and production were carried out in-house. The workmanship was second to none at the time and even Breguet recognized this exceptional quality by listing the Audemars movement number next to his own in the cases - there was no better compliment than that. Louis Audemars died in 1833 and his 8 sons continued the business. However, when the prices of ébauches began to spiral downward while the dealers' margins kept increasing evermore, the family made up their mind to start producing watches under their own name. In a surprising step the 8 Audemars sons decided to all train with different makers and learn all the different aspects of the craft. Around 1850 they returned home and began making use of their combined knowledge for the creation of their own brand. At the time manual work still played a decisive role in the production. However, development did not favour the Audemars. Around 1840 Vacheron & Constantin were the first to equip their factory with production machinery, closely followed by LeCoultre and other companies. In this Vacheron & Constantin were heavily relying on Georget Leschot, a mechanical engineer who had in 1825 created the base for what is today commonly called the "Swiss lever escapement". The new machines worked as well as the craftsmen but three times as fast, which of course reduced the purchasing price of the watches considerably. To counter this development, the Audemars decided to create watches which could not be made by machines; this was the hour of birth of the complicated watch and no other company but Audemars was able to reach such perfect coordination of design, precision and production. Planning for the Universal Exhibition of Vienna 1873 began around 1860; a watch was to be created which was unlike any other ever before. It was to include all complications known to man at the time. These included the "perfect" lever escapement, the keyless wind, 49 jewels and endstones (a first), the double winding system for two trains (another first), the independent seconds according to Pouzait with a second gear-train and a 'whip' whose end meshed with the escape pinion's leaves, minute repetition, a perpetual calendar with leap year compensation (once again a novelty), suspension lock for the gear wheel, hand-polished adjusting levers between the plates and gold gear wheels.