They will thank you for not having to wind it every day. Hence the ME Jubilee is a good one but otherwise consider another electric type like the circular pendulum ones or at 30 day longcase. And on the subject of longcase bear in mind the ceiling height of modern house so perhaps a Vienna Regulator with some kind of electric remontoire would be an idea if you are up for designing it.

Try Ian T Cobb in Leicester

Here’s an original for comparison:

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https://youtube.com/shorts/PsqSty3eV2U?si=pmwmrns6ePVTknNU

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MichaelG

A Battery Driven Electric clock by John Wilding

Horological Journal

December 1977 – September 1978

Denis

Probably the simplist clock to make:

https://www.model-engineer.co.uk/forums/topic/verge-foliot-details/

Please note: Unfortunately, most of the links do not work anymore

Good luck and regards from The Netherlands,

Gep

If you are interested in building a verge and foliot clock, the Dark Lady clock is worth a look. I bought the plans and guides and they are very straightforward and detailed.

https://briansworkshop.weebly.com/

James.

I think the OP had decided on Wilding’s battery clock, probably a good choice.  If there’s a version without contacts using say a hall sensor it would be even better as contacts wear out over time.

Verge & foliot clocks would IMHO be a really bad choice.  On one of the references quoted someone was asking “how do you determine the period of a V&F” – well that’s the problem, it depends very much on the air resistance seen by the foliot and the driving torque since the system doesn’t have a resonance as such.  It’s more of a “relaxation” oscillator like an R-C oscillator, which you wouldn’t expect to have a well defined frequency unless you have very accurate component values and stable voltage.  Since he wants to make two clocks as long-term “remembrance” pieces something where it’s easy to get two “identical” versions keeping time and staying in time for long periods with little maintenance is needed, especially bearing in mind that their owners may not have expertise and finding a qualified repairer in say 10 or 20 years might be difficult, even one who knows about pendulum clocks let alone V&F!