Blog

26 September 2022

We chat to Simon Michlmayr of S. Michlmayr & Co clock and watchmakers… Please tell us a bit about your company: At Michlmayr we repair and service clocks and watches, including pocket watches and barometers. In addition, we also service and maintain local church and tower clocks. We currently have 12 employees, from apprentices to […]

20 July 2021

There is a new addition for ONLY WATCH 2021 – clocks. The biennial charity auction, established to raise funds for research into Duchenne muscular dystrophy, has just announced its horological collection for its next event, on 6 November 2021 in Geneva, and these include the three clocks profiled here, among them the Patek Philippe Complicated […]

12 July 2021

When a child’s first words are ‘tick tock’, it’s a sign of a budding horologist – and that’s certainly been the case for 17-year-old Lewis Walduck, one of the BHI’s newest, and youngest, members and Distance Learning Course students. Based in Oxfordshire, Lewis is taking an apprenticeship with the Clock Work Shop in Winchester (the firm, which […]

28 June 2021

A new world auction record for a British-made wristwatch was set when a Millennium watch by Dr George Daniels CBE FBHI sold for £519,000 (including buyer’s premium). The watch, from 1999, was made in a collaboration between George Daniels (1926–2011) and Roger W Smith, who produced a small number of ‘Millennium’ watches together to mark […]

25 May 2021

It’s been a long time, but we are delighted to say that we have been welcoming horology students back to Upton Hall again and our watchmaking and clockmaking courses are back on. Our first course of 2021 was an Introduction to Watches Taster Day, where we were very pleased to welcome some newcomers to the […]

12 May 2021

A wristwatch made by one of Britain’s foremost contemporary independent watchmakers Roger W Smith OBE FBHI, has sold at auction for Swiss CHF 541,800 (approximately £423,916) including buyer’s premium. The wristwatch, a Series 1 ‘Onely Theo Fennell’, with a rectangular 18 carat gold white case, retrograde date, and a manual wind, from circa 2005, was […]

25 February 2021

A vintage Cartier Tonneau wristwatch from circa 1914, which originally belonged to a British Captain who served on the Western Front in the First World War, has fetched the highest price ever for a Cartier watch sold by Fellows Auctioneers. The 107-year-old watch went for £15,312 (including buyers’ premium) at the auction house’s Luxury Watch […]

22 December 2020

With excellent provenance and by the workshop of Thomas Tompion, a rare, early eighteenth-century gilt metal-mounted, ebony-veneered, quarter-repeating, and striking table clock sold at auction for £262,750. The clock, which had been estimated at between £120,000 and £180,000 was sold by Bonhams at its Fine Clocks auction held in London on Wednesday 16 December 2020. […]

21 December 2020

Many of you will have read in an earlier blog post that the ageing heating system at Upton Hall has finally succumbed to old Father Time, and has broken down to a state of disrepair. Its final act was to spray hot water around the cellar before going to sleep for good. Well and truly […]

16 December 2020

Once again, the combination of an iconic vintage steel sports 1960-70s chronograph, a legendary movie star and motorsports has proved to be a winner. On Saturday 12 December, Phillips in Association with Bacs & Russo, at its New York ‘RACING PULSE’ auction, sold a Heuer Monaco, reference 1133, for a world record price of US […]