Big Ben

The Maple & Co. manufacturer was established in the early 19th c. by John Maple, who specialised in the production and delivery of furniture intended for nobility and the English royal family. Advertisments for this furniture company were placed in fashionable British periodicals for the elite. One of the manors fully furnished by Maple was York Cottage, where King George V and his wife Queen Mary moved in in 1893, after their wedding. The popularity of the selection also attracted the interest of Countess Elżbieta and Count Roman Potocki, who purchased a neo-Gothic chiming clock from the last quarter of the 19th century. Above the clock face, three smaller dials show which one of the clock's functions is selected - the left one turns on the chimes (chime - silent), the middle one speeds up or slows down the clock, and the right one selects the chimes' melody - the sound of the bell tower in the Palace of Westminster or the so-called eight-bell chime. The purchase of the clock by Count and Countess Potocki is connected to the popularity of English influences among European nobility at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries.