Price guide to novelty music boxes. Music boxes come in all shapes and sizes. This post looks at music boxes with unusual shapes and purposes.
A SWISS GILT BRASS MECHANICAL BIRD CAGE MUSIC BOX The domed cage enclosing two singing birds, mounted on a wall bracket with lyre shaped support, 16cm wide, 16cm deep, 30cm high (6in wide, 6in deep, 11 1/2in high) 33cm high
Sold for £ 1,530 (US$ 1,912) inc. premium at Bonham’s in 2019
MULTI-GEM ‘AROUND THE WORLD’ CLOCK AND MUSICAL BOX, GRAFF
Lapis lazuli, rock crystal, circular-cut diamonds, yellow diamonds, emeralds, cabochon rubies, gold, revolving hours, the top opening to reveal the gem-set figure of an explorer, the musical box playing the tune of ‘Around the World’ by Nat King Cole, quartz movement, 22.5×11.8 cm, 2310 gr, signed Graff London, blue Graff case
Sold for CHF 50,000 at Christie’s in 2020
Uncle Sam carved figure Whistler music box. This unusual Whistler musical novelty was made about 25 years ago in Rudesheim Germany, by Siegfried Wendel, who purchased the Griesbaum factory from the original owners. Figure turns head right and left as he whistles “Yankee Doodle” 16” tall.
Sold for US$600 at Donley Auctions in 2020
A GOLD AND ENAMEL SNUFF BOX WITH MUSIC AND AUTOMATON, GUIDON, RÉMOND, GIDE, GENEVA, 1792-1801
oval, the lid painted en plein with Telemachus arriving with Mentor on Calypso’s isle, within a chased and enamelled border, the sides and base decorated in taille d’épargne enamels with a diaper design within similar borders, the sides divided by urns on a ground pierced to help the music be heard, the lid opening to show the complicated coloured gold automaton by which figures in renaissance dress conduct music and peep at an itinerant knife grinder, gilt sur plateau movement
Sold for 225,000 GBP at Sotheby’s in 2020
