circa 1969, navette shaped bark finished champagne dial with black batons and hands, tandem signed 17 jewel mechanical crown wind ETA movement calibre 24/2 69, navette shaped case, 25mm wide point-to-point, bark finished bezel, interior with London hallmarks for 18ct gold and casemaker's mark of Roy Cecil King, to an integral navette shaped bark finished part marked link bracelet, the concealed hinged clasp with figure of eight safety catch, overall length 185mm, 72g ex movement

Roy Cecil King (1913-2000) was a leading British watch designer and jeweller. He began his career aged 14 as an apprentice goldsmith and diamond mounter, while also attending evening classes at the Sir John Cass Art School. By the age of 21, he was foreman of a fine jewellery workshop, and during the 1930s, King was often working, uncredited, for names such as Garrard, Rolex, Cartier and Asprey.

During the War he was a planning engineer working on the production of the Hurricane, and after the War, he began to design and make watches with bought-in movements or as he put it, ‘jewellery that tells the time’, under his own name. When restrictions on the import of Swiss watch movements were lifted in 1960, he signed an exclusive agency agreement with the Swiss watch maison Bueche-Girod, leaving him free to design the exterior of the pieces as he wished. He also began to make watches with straps made wholly from gold, then a novel idea, and this example is typical of his work.

He swept the board at the British Modern Jewellery Exhibition in 1961, winning two first prizes, one second prize and one third prize, with ‘bark finished’ pieces, a finishing technique giving the appearance of tree bark, pioneered by King, featuring prominently.

During the 1960s, the workshop experimented with a wide variety of unconventional methods. Molten gold would be poured through tea strainers before being stretched into shapes to satisfy the most avant garde tastes. King’s 'bark finished' design for bracelets sparked a craze: when George Harrison married Patti Boyd in 1966, she wore one of King’s 'bark finished' wedding bands and 'bark finished' jewellery became the must-have accessory well into the 1970s.

King opened a showroom in Mayfair in 1980 and continued personally to make one-off pieces for clients. He died aged 87 in 2000 and fine examples of his work continue to be sought after collector's pieces.

Condition Report

Crystal - Complete. Some surface scratches, and minor grizzles to the edge at 3 & 4

Dial - In good condition with no obvious sign of damage or deterioration.

Movement - In working order but not tested for timekeeping or endurance

Case - In good condition. Some minor surface scratches and nicks, as to be expected and commensurate with age and use.