At a Glance: 5 Things That Make Our Sourcing Different
- 1. We Go to Sweden — Every clock in our collection is personally sourced in Sweden, not purchased from intermediaries or wholesale antique dealers. We travel to find the pieces ourselves.
- 2. We Know Dalarna — The Mora clock originates in the Dalarna region of central Sweden; our relationships with local dealers, estate agents, and private sellers in this region give us access to pieces that never reach the open market.
- 3. We Assess Every Clock in Person — We inspect the movement, the case, the paint, and the provenance of every clock before we buy it. If it does not meet our standards, we leave it behind.
- 4. We Document Everything — Every clock we purchase is photographed, documented, and assessed for age, condition, and authenticity before it leaves Sweden. This documentation travels with the clock to its new owner.
- 5. We Only Buy What We Would Keep — Our personal standard for every purchase: would we be happy to have this clock in our own home? If the answer is no, we do not buy it.
Every clock in our collection begins its journey in Sweden — found, assessed, and chosen by us in person.
Introduction
Every antique Mora clock has a story. It was made by hand in a workshop in Dalarna, Sweden, perhaps two hundred and fifty years ago. It stood in a farmhouse or a manor house, marking the hours through generations of the same family. It survived wars, migrations, and the upheavals of history. And then, somehow, it found its way to us — and through us, to a new home and a new chapter.
At Mora Clock, we believe that understanding where a clock comes from is as important as understanding what it is. This post takes you behind the scenes of our sourcing process — how we find authentic Mora clocks in Sweden, how we assess them, and how we decide which pieces are worthy of our collection.
Why We Go to Sweden
It might seem obvious that a specialist in Swedish Mora clocks would source their pieces in Sweden — but in practice, many dealers in the UK and USA purchase from intermediaries, wholesale antique exporters, or auction houses that have already done the sourcing work. This is a perfectly legitimate approach, but it comes with a cost: you are buying someone else's selection, at someone else's margin, with someone else's assessment of authenticity and condition.
The finest Mora clocks rarely reach the open market — they are found through relationships and local knowledge.
We go to Sweden because the best clocks — the pieces with the finest original paint, the most interesting provenance, the most characterful movements — rarely reach the open market. They are found through relationships: with local antique dealers who have been in business for decades, with estate agents who handle the contents of old farmhouses and manor houses, with private families who are ready to part with a piece that has been in their home for generations.
Building these relationships takes time. We have been doing this for years, and the network we have developed in Dalarna and the surrounding regions of central Sweden is one of our most valuable assets. It is what allows us to offer pieces that our customers simply cannot find anywhere else.
The Dalarna Region: The Home of the Mora Clock
The Mora clock takes its name from the town of Mora in Dalarna, the region of central Sweden where clockmaking became a cottage industry in the mid-18th century. The story begins in 1741, when two young men from Mora — Krång Anders Andersson and Mats Ström — walked to Stockholm to learn the craft of clockmaking, then returned home to teach their neighbours. Within a generation, the making of longcase clocks had become one of the primary industries of the region, with hundreds of craftsmen producing movements, cases, and dials in a remarkable example of pre-industrial specialisation.
The folk-art decoration on Mora clocks reflects the artistic traditions of the Dalarna region — each piece is a product of its place.
Understanding this history is essential to understanding the clocks themselves. The movements were made by specialist movement-makers; the cases by specialist case-makers; the dials by specialist dial-painters. A finished Mora clock was the product of an entire community's expertise, assembled and sold by a clockmaker who coordinated the various trades. This is why the quality of individual components can vary within a single clock — and why knowing what to look for in each element is so important.
When we source in Dalarna, we are sourcing in the region where these clocks were made, where the local knowledge of what constitutes a genuine piece is deepest, and where the supply of authentic examples — while finite — is still the richest in the world.
How We Assess a Clock
When we encounter a potential purchase — whether at an estate sale, in a dealer's workshop, or in a private home — our assessment follows a consistent process that we have refined over many years.
Inspecting the movement is the first and most important step in our assessment process.
We begin with the movement. We open the hood, examine the plates and pillars, assess the condition of the pivot holes and gear teeth, and check the escapement. A genuine antique movement will show the characteristic hand-finishing of pre-industrial manufacture — file marks, uneven surfaces, hand-cut gear teeth. We look for evidence of previous repairs, replaced components, or conversion to a different power source. A movement that has been well maintained and honestly repaired is not a problem; a movement that has been concealed or misrepresented is a reason to walk away.
Next, we examine the case. We look at the paint — is it original, or has it been repainted? We check the wood — is it birch throughout, or have panels been replaced with a different timber? We look at the proportions — does the case have the characteristic hourglass silhouette of a genuine Mora clock, or has it been altered? We examine the interior of the case, where paint is rarely touched up and the original wood is most clearly visible.
Finally, we consider the provenance. Where has the clock been? Does it have any documentation — auction records, family history, dealer receipts? The more we know about a clock's history, the more confident we can be in our assessment of its authenticity and age.
What We Leave Behind
We are asked sometimes whether we ever walk away from a clock. The answer is: frequently. The antique market contains many pieces that are not what they appear to be — heavily restored examples presented as original, reproduction cases fitted with genuine movements, or modern clocks artificially aged to look antique.
Only the clocks that meet our full assessment criteria make it into our collection.
We leave behind any clock that we cannot authenticate to our own satisfaction. We leave behind clocks that have been so heavily restored that their original character has been lost. We leave behind clocks whose provenance is unclear or whose sellers are unable or unwilling to answer our questions. And we leave behind clocks that are simply not good enough — pieces that are technically genuine but lack the quality, character, or condition that our customers deserve.
This selectivity means that we do not always have a large inventory. But it means that every clock we do offer is one we are genuinely proud of — a piece we would be happy to have in our own home, and one we are confident will give its new owner decades of pleasure.
From Sweden to Your Home
Once a clock has passed our assessment and we have agreed a purchase, the process of bringing it home begins. We arrange specialist packing and freight, ensure all necessary export documentation is in order, and begin the process of preparing the clock for sale — cleaning, minor conservation where needed, and full documentation of its condition and history.
From a Swedish farmhouse to your home — every clock in our collection makes a remarkable journey.
Every clock that reaches our collection comes with a full written description of its history, condition, and authenticity — the documentation that allows you to buy with complete confidence and, if you ever choose to sell, to pass on the clock's story to its next owner.
Browse our current collection to see the pieces we have brought home most recently — and if you have any questions about our sourcing process or the provenance of a specific clock, please get in touch. We love talking about this, and we are always happy to share what we know.
Mora Clock — specialists in authentic antique Swedish Mora clocks, sourced in person from the heart of Dalarna.