Vintage Agme Sliding Initials Powder Compact, Silver-Tone with Gold Botanical Engraving, Mechanical Letter Dial, Made in Switzerland, Original Slip, 1940s-1950s

Slide left. Slide right. Your initials, set in gold on black.

This is the Agme sliding initials compact: a Swiss-made powder compact built with a mechanical letter-dial system set into the face. Two side sliders, one on each edge of the compact, each controlling an independent letter cartouche at the centre of the face. Push the slider and the letter changes, cycling through the alphabet in gold block type on a black enamel ground, each letter clicking into its recessed square frame. You personalise it yourself, on the spot, without engraving. It is a piece of mid-century Swiss precision engineering applied to a vanity object, and it works perfectly.

There is one gap in the sequence: the letter I is absent. The mechanism runs cleanly from H directly to J. Whether the I tile was never cut for this run or was the one letter lost somewhere in the intervening decades is a question the compact cannot answer. Every other letter is present and functioning.

The exterior face is silver-tone with a spectacular two-tone design: a fine parallel-line engine-turned silver ground over which gold-tone botanical engraving flows freely, chrysanthemum fronds and curling tendrils moving across the face in warm gold against the cooler silver. The border and spine are plain warm gold-tone. Made in Switzerland is stamped along the inner rim. The interior carries a full-width mirror in excellent order and the original cream powder puff and sifter in the base section, both barely touched.

The Particulars:

• Maker: Agme, Made in Switzerland; stamp to inner rim
• Form: Large square powder compact with mechanical two-slot sliding initial dial system
• Mechanism: Two independent side sliders, each cycling one letter cartouche through the full alphabet; gold block letter on black enamel ground; working perfectly
• Note: Letter I absent from the sequence; dial runs H directly to J. All other letters present and functional.
• Exterior: Silver-tone with gold-tone botanical engraving over engine-turned ground; gold-tone border, spine banding, and clasp
• Interior: Full-width mirror (excellent, no spotting); original cream puff and intact sifter to base section
• Included: Original Agme compact slip
• Not included: Outer retail box
• Condition: Near-mint overall. Missing I noted and shown. Please review all photos carefully before purchasing.
• Period: 1940s-1950s

It goes H, then J. The I is somewhere else entirely.

Arrives tucked inside its own treasure coffin and carefully wrapped as a vault relic, ready for gifting or keeping.