From the house
The Owl is finished
· Seattle
At a little after seven this morning, in the Atelier, Ottilie Brandvold wound the Owl for the first time. When she lifted the key away, it turned its head toward the sound.
The Owl was commissioned by the President on 3 March 2008, as a piece that would show without explanation what the house can do. Thirty-one people have worked on it in the eleven years and seven months since. It has 4,812 parts and 2,206 feathers, each set by hand, and two glass eyes that took the ocularist fourteen months. Its certificate was entered in the Register this afternoon as No. 118 204 and lists every one of its makers in the order in which they worked.
The house will tell everyone who sees it that it is a replica of no owl in particular, modeled closely on several. It turns its head to sound, blinks in three ways, preens, sleeps through the day and wakes at dusk.
It will be shown in the Salon on Thursday evenings from next month. It is not for sale. The Master of the Atelier has asked visitors to remember that it sleeps through the day.