Precious Time: An Ormolu and Enamel Clock, 1855

Clock
Ormolu and Enamel
French
Levy Frères, 1855
The Victoria and Albert Museum

A masterpiece of ormolu and deep blue enamel, this clock by the celebrated clockmakers Levy Frères, depicts the four seasons as dancing putti. This magnificent timepiece was displayed at the Paris Exhibition of 1855 where it was purchased for £19 4s.


The clock’s style is evidence of the growing Rococo Revival which had swept mid-Nineteenth Century France. The revival of the style was more restrained than its Eighteenth Century inception. Considerably more rigid and less wild, the Rococo Revival borrowed the ideals of Neoclassicism and combined them with the curves and volutes of the Rococo.