The £165,000 Petrovich Villa — Concealed Fortune of a Forgotten Clockmaker’s Workshop

Petrovich Villa’s clockmaker’s workshop carried the quiet weight of deferred time. Within, £165,000 had been bound in instruments, commissions, and intricate mechanisms—fortunes calculated in brass and mahogany, now concealed beneath layers of dust.

Gears, Pendulums, and Calculated Fortune

Viktor Sergeyevich Petrovich, master clockmaker and horological engineer, was born in 1858 in Saint Petersburg.

Trained in European workshops, he supplied private patrons and civic institutions with bespoke timepieces. Married to Anya Petrovich, father to a daughter named Sofia, his presence is legible through objects: engraved screwdrivers, brass clock faces inscribed with his full legal name, bundles of client correspondence, half-finished timepieces resting on velvet pads, and a ledger meticulously recording fortune from orders and deposits. His daily rhythm was precise—calibration at dawn, assembly by midday, record-keeping by lamplight—reflecting a temperament meticulous, methodical, and patient.

Lost Patrons and Financial Freeze

By 1912, political upheaval and economic sanctions disrupted the European luxury market. Patrons defaulted; commissions halted. The workshop preserves the interruption: clocks left unwound, cogs sorted but unused, ledgers ending mid-column. Some completed orders may have been reclaimed; many remain, their fortune recorded yet unrealized.

A final note beneath a polished pendulum reads: “Maintain until payment received.” Payment never arrived. Petrovich Villa remains abandoned indoors, its workshop intact, its mechanisms still, and its concealed fortune suspended between movement and silence.