An impressive range of watchmakers, needlewomen, bootmakers, cellar masters, jewellers, baggage-makers, wine riddling specialists, head seamstresses and head chefs were on hand to welcome visitors and reveal the secrets of their respective professions. Thanks to this unique event, visitors were able to get a backstage look at a dream world and to share the passion of these artisans united by the same taste for excellence.

It was in the exceptional town of Le Locle, of which the industrial architecture is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage site, in the very spot where the founder created his company in 1865, that Zenith welcomed about 400 visitors to its Manufacture from 8 am onward last Saturday and Sunday.

Proud of having recently completed the renovation of its main building, and of having done so with complete respect for its watchmaking heritage, the brand with the guiding star invited the public to enter its ultra-modern workshops where traditional tools rub shoulders with avant-garde technologies.

Generation after generation, the Manufacture owes its reputation to the talent and passion of its artisans. It is they whom the brand’s guests were able to meet in the course of these two open days that provided a chance to discover some of the 80 professions involved in the production of a Zenith watch and its components during a process that takes an average of nine months. From making movement blanks to cutting out components and on to decorating and assembling a movement, visitors were able to follow the various stages right the way through to the finished product. This event gave the brand a chance to provide all devotees of Fine Watchmaking with a vivid reminder that, at the heart of each Zenith watch, beats a Zenith movement developed and produced within this historical Manufacture of a company that has 330 employees worldwide, of which 270 in Le Locle. At the end of this experience, everyone undoubtedly left the premises with their head full of stories to be told and stars in their eyes…

Source: Zenith