Swiss French 18 carat gold important à goutte pocket watch Circa 1878

Pocket watch with eight complications
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An important full hunter cased watch with eight complications, made by Louis Audemars and LeRoy & Fils, circa  1878. The numbered full hunter case of this watch was crafted from 18 carat gold, features the Louis Audemars punch and the cuvette is marked with the addresses at which LeRoy operated. The white enamel dial has an outer ring with Arabic five minute numerals, Roman hour numerals, dials at 3, 6, 9 and 12 o’clock for respectively the dates, moon phase and age, days and a ‘real’ perpetual calendar with consideration of leap years and gold and blued steel hands. The movement of the greatest rarity and highest quality has a precision lever escapement, eight complications, seconde morte with tandem winding, a minute repeater, moon phase with moon age and a ‘real’ perpetual calendar that considers leap years.
The cuvette is numbered and signed.
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Diameter: 56,5 mm
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Weight: 187 g
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Signed: LeRoy & Fils, H^GERS de la Marine
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The watch comes with an extract from the archives and is described and illustrated in Hartmut Zantke’s ‘Louis Audemars, his Life and Work’. The extract from the archives confirms the extremely rare combination of complications and that the watch was finished by LeRoy & Fils.
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Louis Audemars and LeRoy & Fils collaborated closely to create this watch around 1878. However, legally speaking, it was not a traditional “corporate partnership”. Instead, this timepiece represents a masterpiece of the établisseur system, which was the dominant business model in 19^th century Swiss French luxury watchmaking. How the Collaboration Worked:
The Maker (Louis Audemars): The legendary Swiss workshop of Louis Audemars & Fils (based in Le Brassus) acted as the master movement manufacturer. They handcraft the incredibly complex, ultra-complicated inner mechanism, which featured advanced complications like a perpetual calendar, moon phases, a chronograph, and a minute repeater.
The Retailer (LeRoy & Fils): Based in Paris, LeRoy & Fils (Watchmakers to the French Ministry of the Navy and European royalty) was the elite luxury house that commissioned the work. They cased the watch, added their signature to the dial or inner cuvette (dust cover) and retailed it to high society clients.