Precious Time: A Guilloché Enamel and Diamond Desk Clock, Before 1896

Desk Clock
Michael Perchin
Fabergé
Silver, guilloché enamel, rose diamonds, pearls.
Before 1896
The Royal Collection

Queen Victoria—sometime prior to 1896—commissioned Michael Perchin of Fabergé to create this elegant desk clock of blue guilloché enamel, rose-cut diamonds and pearls. The diamonds are set in a fleur-de-lis pattern. It is believed that the clock was meant to be a gift from Victoria to the French Royal Family. However, it doesn’t seem to have made its way there.


In fact, it kind of disappeared for awhile until Queen Elizabeth (the Queen Mother, not Queen Elizabeth II) purchased it sometime in the late 1930’s. Now, it sits happily with its other Fabergé and variously enameled and jewel-encrusted brethren in the Royal Collection. It has a cousin who was designed to lie flat instead of to sit upright which can be found in the Forbes Collection.