A mine of extremely rare skills

3 minutes read
Its craftsmen are the very last in the world to manufacture the famous singing birds that sound so perfect they are mistaken for real ones.

Tribune des Arts - No324 - September 2004

J.-C. P.

 

All that is needed to produce a very fine music box mechanism is a little steel and a whole raft of skills that are as specialised as they are rare. This is the miracle that the Reuge manufactury at Sainte-Croix manages to perform every day.

“Everything is made on site, even the valuable wooden cabinets which are sourced from our own workshop in Italy”, explains Aldo Magada, CEO of Reuge, who is in the throes of dusting down this venerable firm - first established in 1865 and still the record-holder for the world's smallest music box (duly listed in the Guinness Book of Records) - whose craftsmen are the very last to manufacture the famous songbirds which birdwatchers, if they close their eyes, are said to mistake for the original living ones.

 

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Unobtainable machines

A visit to the Reuge manufactury in the heart of Sainte-Croix, near Yverdon, is a unique experience. Were it only the discovery of astonishing machines which are capable, for example, of automatically tuning the comb of a music box, adjusting each comb tooth and filing it until it produces the right note. Or indeed machines capable of riveting thousands of pins (up to 5,000) onto cylinders depending on the desired - and previously digitised - tune.

But above all, it is the human hand that makes the difference. Whether it involves dipping the combs in steel, sticking on “feathers” (nowadays made of kevlar) under the comb teeth to dampen the vibrations (a little like a piano pedal), tuning the world's smallest comb, which is done using a dentist's drill, or assembling the mechanism, which requires the qualities of a complete watchmaker and of a timer, each closed in isolation inside a booth to avoid dust.

The Reuge manufactury thus relies on a number or watchmakers, especially since it also offers striking enamelled watches incorporating automata (sometimes even erotic ones) together with a music box movement. Miniature marvels worthy of the famous “conversation pieces” of the 19th century.

 

Keeper of the secrets of Blaise Bontems

A great tradition that allows Aldo Magada to embark on wholly contemporary innovations, in terms of form and function alike. As a result, Reuge now offers alarms that rouse you from the arms of Morpheus to the sound of your favourite tune or to birdsong so perfect that it is mistaken for the real thing. The manufactury has in fact been able to recover all the secrets (of both whistles and bellows) of the celebrated Blaise Bontems who, in the 19th century, spent his life studying birdsong in an attempt to reproduce it perfectly.

Objects that are both practical and well-designed for the office or as gifts, are equally plentiful: paperweights, photo frames, desk-tidies, letter holders, incense holders, candleholders, and so forth, all fitted of course with a superb music box mechanism (comprising 36 combs) ready to play a well-known tune. The wonder of pure and wholly authentic sounds due entirely to the vibration of a steel comb and not to electronic connections.

 

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Under the aegis of Patrice Drezet, up to 5,000 pins are fixed onto the biggest cylinders. This allows almost any tune to be played. Even Phil Collins has had music boxes built to play tunes of his own composition.
DR

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The final assembly requires the qualities of a complete watchmaker and timer such as those possessed by Alain Bertrand. DR


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Proudly presented by Alexandra Louvrier, head of marketing, this luxury music box plays dozens of tunes ... it is worth just under a million francs, a price that does not deter some amateurs passionate about outstanding objects.DR


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Nadine Bietry is fixing small pieces of kevlar (feathers) under the teeth to prevent them from vibrating for too long. An operation known as “plumage”. DR

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