Cartier Rare “Royking” 18k Gold & Red Lacquer, Vintage, circa 1970

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Cartier Rare “Royking” 18k Gold & Red Lacquer, Vintage, circa 1970

About the Item

Cartier “Royking” lighter. Circe 1970 CARTIER Roy King Rollagas, a Unique RARE example of a ROYKING designed Cartier Rollagas lighter made circa 1970's, 18K Gold Baroque Inlay with Red lacquer, mint condition. Roy King emblem on top side part of Cartier. The Lighter Includes original Cartier case. ROY KING, who has died aged 87, was a leading British watch designer and jeweller, with customers ranging from Saudi princes to The Beatles and Tom Jones. King began his career at the age of 14 as an apprentice goldsmith and diamond mounter in Hatton Garden. By 21 he was foreman of a workshop, creating one-off pieces which readily found buyers (including members of the Royal Family) through Bond Street jewellers. Much of his work in the 1930s was also as an uncredited manufacturer for names such as Rolex, Cartier, Asprey and Garrard. After the war, King began to design and make watches under his own name. When restrictions on the import of Swiss watch movements were lifted in 1960, King decided to integrate these into his own designs, recognising that, whoever the manufacturer might be, people still wanted "Swiss Made" moving parts. He signed an exclusive agency agreement with Bueche-Girod, the Swiss movement makers, which left 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. In 1961, the Roy King workshop swept the board at the British Modern Jewellery Exhibition, winning two first prizes, as well as one second and one third prize. The winning pieces are now in the permanent collection of Goldsmiths' Hall.During the 1960s, the workshop produced many designs using a 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 finish" design for bracelets sparked a craze: when George Harrison married Patti Boyd in 1966, she wore one of King's bark finish wedding bands. Roy Cecil King was born in Kentish Town, London, on May 6 1913. His unmarried mother handed him as a baby to an elderly foster mother, Mrs Wells, who eventually adopted him. Mr Wells, a road sweeper, died in the great influenza outbreak of 1919 and soon afterwards young Cecil, as he was then called, found himself standing in a walk-in cupboard while his future was discussed in the cramped tenement room where he lived. At one time, it seemed as if he would have to be taken in by Dr Barnardo's, and even as a pupil at Haverstock Hill Central School he had to deliver hand-laundered shirts (at 2d a time) to help with household bills. One of his customers managed a large jewellery firm in Hatton Garden, M J Greengross, and in 1927 he was offered an apprenticeship. On his first day at the bench, King was put next to a consumptive Italian master craftsman and told to learn what he could before the man died. A tubercular cough rendered King's taskmaster highly impatient, and he would crush with a mallet any work which fell short of perfection. In the evenings, King went to classes at the Sir John Cass Art School, perfecting his skills at diamond mounting. In his spare time he performed in a jazz band as a pianist and comic master of ceremonies. During the Second World War, King worked as a planning engineer on the production line of the Hurricane, eventually heading up a 100-strong department at De Havilland. There he used machine tool techniques which he would later apply with great success to jewellery and watch manufacture.He then set up his own workshop in Watford, where he offered "everything from a tiara to a tiepin". In 1952 he produced five strawberry leaf tiaras for duchesses to wear at the Coronation. At about this time, King began exporting his pieces to offset the effects of the then 100 per cent tax on luxury goods in Britain. He soon began to concentrate on watch manufacture, or, as he described it, "jewelry”

Creator:
Cartier
Metal:
18k Gold
Style:
Baroque
Place of Origin:
France
Period:
Late 20th Century
Date of Manufacture:
1970
Condition:
Wear consistent with age and use. All original parts.
Seller Location:
New York, NY
Reference Number:
1stDibs: LU2640218674002

Shop All Cartier

Cartier

For its extraordinary range of bracelets, watches, rings and other adornments, French luxury house Cartier is undeniably one of the most well known and internationally revered jewelers in the world among clients both existing and aspirational.

Perhaps 1847 was not the ideal time to open a new watchmaking and jewelry business, as the French Revolution was not kind to the aristocracy who could afford such luxuries. Nevertheless, it was the year Louis-François Cartier (1819–1904) — who was born into poverty — founded his eponymous empire, assuming control of the workshop of watchmaker Adolphe Picard, under whom he had previously been employed as an assistant. Of course, in the beginning, it was a relatively modest affair, but by the late 1850s, Cartier had its first royal client, Princess Mathilde Bonaparte, niece of Napoleon Bonaparte, who commissioned the jeweler to design brooches, earrings and other accessories.

Under the leadership of Louis-François’s son, Alfred, who took over in 1874, business boomed. Royalty around the world wore Cartier pieces, including Tsar Nicholas II of Russia, the Maharaja of Patiala and King Edward VII, who had 27 tiaras made by the jewelry house for his coronation in 1902 and issued Cartier a royal warrant in 1904. (Today, the British royal family still dons Cartier pieces; Kate Middleton, Duchess of Cambridge, regularly sports a Ballon Bleu de Cartier watch.)

Cartier’s golden years, however, began when Alfred introduced his three sons, Louis, Pierre and Jacques, to the business. The brothers expanded Cartier globally: Louis reigned in Paris, Pierre in New York and Jacques in London, ensuring their brand’s consistency at their branches across the world. The trio also brought in such talents as Charles Jacqueau and Jeanne Toussaint.

One of Cartier’s earliest major successes was the Santos de Cartier watch — one of the world's first modern wristwatches for men. (Previously, a large number of people were using only pocket watches.) Louis designed the timepiece in 1904 for his friend, popular Brazilian aviator Alberto Santos-Dumont, who wanted to be able to check the time more easily while flying.

Cartier’s other famous timepieces include the Tank watch, which was inspired by the linear form of military tanks during World War I, and the so-called mystery clocks. Invented by watchmaker and magician Jean-Eugène Robert-Houdin and later crafted exclusively for Cartier in the house’s workshop by watchmaker Maurice Couët, the mystery clocks were so named because the integration of glass dials on which the clocks’ hands would seemingly float as well as structures that are hidden away within the base give the illusion that they operate without machinery.

On the jewelry side of the business, Cartier’s internationally renowned offerings include the Tutti Frutti collection, which featured colorful carved gemstones inspired by Jacques’s trip to India and grew in popularity during the Art Deco years; the panthère motif, which has been incorporated into everything from brooches to rings; and the Love bracelet, a minimal, modernist locking bangle inspired by medieval chastity belts that transformed fine jewelry.

While the Cartier family sold the business following the death of Pierre in 1964, the brand continues to innovate today, renewing old hits and creating new masterpieces.

On 1stDibs, find a growing collection of contemporary and vintage Cartier watches, engagement rings, necklaces and other accessories.