The World's Most Expensive Doll

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed)
Apr 10th 2006 at 10:01AM

The interesting object shown here is the world's most expensive doll. Known as L'Oiseleur (The Bird Trainer) it is a four foot tall figure of a young man holding a flute and dressed in Renaissance clothing. The doll, which has an asking price of $6,250,000 was created in a Swiss workshop. Once wound with a golden key, the doll plays the flute, blowing "Marche des Rois" by Georges Bizet. His fingers play the instrument and his eyes move back and forth. Two birds, one on his shouler and one on his hand, sing along, opening and closing their beaks, turning their heads and flapping their wings. Most amazingly the entire show is powered by tiny cogs and gears (no batteries or other power source). The doll has 2,340 parts and took 15,000 hours to create.

Tags: automata, device, doll, expensive doll, ExpensiveDoll, mechanical, oddities