Mondlicht
moonlight over the high forest
- Wood
- Linden, dark-waxed · walnut dial
- Movement
- Eight-day mechanical, brass
- Carving
- 460 hours carved
€ 14,800Open the dossier
Uhrenhaus · Schonach im Schwarzwald · seit 1854
The forestkeeps time.
Cuckoo clocks raised by one family for seven generations. Twelve leave the house each year — one for each hour of the dial.
Schonach im Schwarzwald
I.
The house
We do not manufacture clocks. We raise them.
A cuckoo clock is a small house for time. Ours are carved from linden felled in the waning January moon — Mondholz, "moon wood" — and air-dried for eleven years under the roof of this house before an iron touches it. The movement is brass, mechanical, eight days to a winding. The call is two notes, a falling minor third, made by twin bellows and two fir whistles, as it has been made here since 1854.
- MDCCCLIVFounded in Schonach
- VIIGenerations of one family
- XIIClocks leave the house each year
- XIYears the wood rests before carving
II.
Das Kabinett
Twelve departures a year.
The clocks currently in the house. Each carries its Werkverzeichnis number — the ledger the family has kept, without a missing entry, since 1854.
Tannenruh
the stillness of firs under snow
- Wood
- Linden, natural · fir-bough relief
- Movement
- Eight-day mechanical, brass
- Carving
- 640 hours carved
€ 21,400Open the dossier
Waldkauz
the tawny owl keeps the third watch
- Wood
- Walnut case · linden carving
- Movement
- Eight-day mechanical, brass, night silence
- Carving
- 520 hours carved
€ 19,600Open the dossier
Abendläuten
evening bells across the valley
- Wood
- Linden, smoked · gilt-brass pendulum
- Movement
- Eight-day mechanical, brass
- Carving
- 780 hours carved
€ 26,200Open the dossier
III.
In private hands
The ledger does not close.
Every clock since 1854 stands in the Werkverzeichnis. Owners may write for the record of their clock — its wood, its felling winter, its hours — at any time. These left the house most recently.
- WV 199HirschrufVienna2023
- WV 190WintergangKyoto2019
- WV 183NachtwacheNew York2016
- WV 171Erster SchneeZurich2011
- WV 158Stiller GrundHamburg2006
IV.
Die Familie
Seven generations of one name.
Since 1854 the Werkverzeichnis has been signed Waldvogel. Matthias carved the first case; Frieda, the fourth, kept the benches working through two wars; Elias, the seventh, signs it today. His daughter Marta, the eighth, already cuts her own fir boughs. No clock leaves this house that a Waldvogel has not held.
The masters of the house
- I.Matthias Waldvogel1854–1881
- II.Johann Waldvogel1881–1907
- III.Albrecht Waldvogel1907–1934
- IV.Frieda Waldvogel1934–1961
- V.Georg Waldvogel1961–1987
- VI.Lorenz Waldvogel1987–2011
- VII.Elias Waldvogel2011–
- VIII.Marta Waldvogelapprenticed 2019
V.
Die Werkstatt
Between three hundred and nine hundred hours.
A carving begins on paper, then in linden, with chisels ground in this workshop and a mallet worn to the shape of one hand. The relief is cut with the grain of the year-rings, so the shadow falls as it would on a living bough. Nothing is sanded that can be finished by the blade.
VI.
Die Urkunde
No clock leaves without its papers.
Each clock carries the VdS certificate of the Verein die Schwarzwalduhr — mechanical movement, every essential part made in the Black Forest — and the house's own attestation: the wood, its felling winter, the hours of carving, and the master's signature.
VII.
Der Auftrag
Commission a clock that does not yet exist.
A bespoke clock begins with a correspondence and, if the house accepts, an audience — in Schonach or by letter. The carving record is sent monthly. When the clock is ready, a clockmaker of the house travels to hang it, start it, and hear the first call in its own room. We call this the investiture.
The house accepts three commissions a year.