George Nelson Clock No. 2280  

Congratulations MidMod
That's a great clock! Have only seen it once before a few years back on Ebay, but it was white and missing the cool doorknob shaped second hand. Is that second hand a vacuumed formed plastic piece? There were a few Nelson clocks from that time that were using vacuumed formed plastic elements. The second hand on your new clock is unlike any other second hand on any of the other Nelson clocks and would certainly fall in to the same idea as the Motion-Notion clocks. Would love to know if there are any other ones like yours floating around out there or in other collectors' collections. BTW, how was the Vitra exhibit in Spain?

nice clock.
http://wright20.com/auctions/view/IIE9/IIFA/140/LA/none/I41E/1

Wow
it's a beauty

Plastic second hand and Spain
The second hand is plastic and, I assume, vacuum formed. It probably had to be plastic to make it light enough to work with the second hand. By the way, this is one of the only "motion notion" style clocks in which the second hand is functional as well as decorative. By using two differently painted hemispheres, the clock actually tracks seconds as they pass.
It's also clear why this one never went into larger scale production. It's impossible to see the stubby hour hand from some angles because it's blocked by the second hand, which sticks out from the clock a couple of inches. If you look at the picture (thanks for posting rockland), you can't even see it from the angle from which the photograph was taken.
As for the Vitra exhibit, the presentation at the Fundacion Barrie in A Coruna, Spain was marvelous. They have a great open space; and the clocks are on a two plus story wall that really highlights them. Neater still is that the exhibit is open to the public for free and is downtown so there was quite a bit of public interest. I'll try to figure out how to post a picture. It was an interesting contrast to the Vitra Museum exhibition, which divided up the exhibit into the distinct aspects of George Nelson's work (clocks, home, office, etc.) like the book itself. It's been posted before, but the Youtube video of the Nelson Exhibit at the Vitra Museum gives a real flavor:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i94M-sj3Zlw

I'm a bit surprised
that it's missing in the Vitra Nelson book. It's generally so complete, although the pictures in the list area are a bit small.
By the way, a late friend of mine (who got me started on all of this collecting) had one of those "not manufactured" ceramic clocks (the number was probably 2208; it's the one on the top left of page 288). His was grey colored and one of the flower petals were broken off and he had it repaired.
I wonder how "not manufactured" it really was if he had it. I'm not sure where he found it; he sold all of his clocks back in the 1990's (probably to either Fifty/50 or Andy Warhol). Not sure where the clocks are now.

That's a nice story, Barry,
And a great clock. I've always liked the ceramic models, but I don't have any of them. I've just missed out on the ones that came available or was quickly outbid for the ones that came up at auction. Though obviously they were manufactured to some extent, they are very, very rare.
I actually started collecting after I inherited several vintage items from my grandparents. Nobody else in my family wanted the items [thinking they were too uncomfortable] so I got them, researched and learned they were all vintage Herman Miller and Knoll pieces, and went from there.