orological history could begin like a fairy tale with the words “Once upon a time...”. This story – one that may seem like a minor detail in the grand adventure of human history – belongs to what is considered one of the foundations of civillisation, – which in turn is notably defined by humans’ mastery of their environment.

However arbitrary it may be, calculating time is an integral part of humans’ management of their living space. Over time, a correlation has emerged between the “refinement” of a civilisation and the division of its calendar. Even today, the calendars of certain extinct civilisations continue to fascinate us. The more advanced a society is in its control over its environment, the more refined its perception of time and the stronger its desire to express its hold over that environment. In the beginning was day and night

The first human calendars date back to the dawn of time, so caution is required, especially given the lack of absolute scientific or historical certainty (indeed, debate continues to rage over the primacy of certain developments as recent as the twentieth century!).

Today, we trace the appearance of these first calendars back to the late Neolithic period. Some researchers believe that the dots and lines added by hunter-gatherers next to the animals depicted in caves could be calendar indications. Herbivore shoulder blades (in the Périgord Noir region of France) and stones (near Rome) engraved with marks suggesting lunar calendars have been dated to this period.

The 365-day Egyptian solar calendar was long considered the oldest in the world. However, recent discoveries made in the Turkish city of Göbekli Tepe suggest that the first true calendar dates back more than 12,000 years, according to researchers at the University of Edinburgh. Later, during the Bronze Age, humans built monuments – such as Stonehenge, Carnac in Brittany and L’Hospitalet-du-Larzac in the Causses – for group celebrations during regular astronomical events calculated by shamans whose knowledge was passed down orally (solstices, equinoxes, precession of major stars, comets, eclipses…).

In the second millennium BCE, the Babylonians, who are known to have been great astronomers, are believed to have invented the gnomon and, incidentally, the sundial. A few centuries later, circa 1600 BCE, the Egyptians are thought to have developed the first water clocks. The oldest is believed to be the one discovered in Karnak in 1904, which can be seen in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. A few artefacts enable us to estimate the accuracy of these machines to be within a few minutes per hour.

These instruments were then vastly improved by the Greeks. The Greek inventor Ctesibius – after whom the most famous water clock was named – succeeded in devising a system that enabled the water instrument to maintain a constant flow, ensuring its accuracy. Numerous creations then appeared in the major Greek cities and in certain major religious centres such as Delphi.

The gear wheel

• Date of invention: unknown.
• Use in horology: transmission and multiplication of force.
• Materials used: iron, brass, copper, wood, etc.
• Weight: from 300 kilograms for monumental clocks to less than 0.5 gram for a watch.

It is reported that the Antikythera mechanism (covered in-depth in issue 1/24) was intended for this sanctuary. The highly sophisticated device was clearly designed to be connected to a water clock in order to provide calendar and astronomical information without the need for human intervention. Rome also developed fascinating water clocks, as did the Persian and Chinese empires.

Yi Xing, Su Song

We know that the Buddhist monk Yi Xing (683-727 BCE), in addition to his masterful astronomical studies, created an armillary sphere clock powered by a hydraulic escapement. Some time later, in 807 BCE, the Caliph of Baghdad, Harun al-Rashid, presented Emperor Charlemagne with a small yet highly complex automaton water clock. In 1088, Chinese engineer and scientist Su Song had a complex astronomical water clock built in Kaifeng, over ten metres high and equipped with a mechanism consisting of buckets mounted on a continuous transmission chain.

Unexpected links between clocks and roasting spits

A little later, these water clocks – known in the West through accounts of the Crusades and manuscripts – prompted religious orders to equip their monasteries with them to regulate their daily regimen of prayer, even though monastic time was initially divided into eight periods as follows: Matins, Lauds, Prime, Terce, Sext (noon), None, Vespers and Compline.

Many researchers believe that the first clocks were an extrapolation of the striking mechanisms with which most monastic water clocks were equipped. Driven by weights and appearing during the twelfth century, they must have mechanically resembled ancient roasting spits, where the piece of meat rotating on these devices played the same role as the oscillator, while the foliot escapement sequenced the rotation like the one used for striking water clocks (read our article on the unexpected links between clocks and roasting spits!).

In those distant eras, the importance of mastering time could certainly escape ordinary people who mostly lived in rural environments and whose experience of time revolved around natural events, marked by a regular succession of religious festivals. On the other hand, for the growing number of city dwellers from the twelfth century onwards, it was becoming all the more urgent to structure these reference points, as mastering time was tantamount to asserting one’s intellectual superiority over untamed Nature.

The newly emerged art of horology conveyed the time solely by means of bells (hands did not yet exist) and gradually imposed the duodecimal system inherited from the Assyro-Babylonians. The all-powerful Church was the master of the calendar during this era.

Mechanising the passage of time

From the thirteenth century onwards, the machines that divided the daily time of city dwellers into equal periods had to be equipped with a verge escapement and a counterwheel (a regulating mechanism with a recoil). Although very imperfect from a chronometric standpoint, this mechanism – sometimes enhanced with automata to indicate the hours (Strasbourg circa 1350 or the jaquemarts of Courtrai-Dijon) – was to continue until the early decades of the nineteenth century in certain Comtoise clocks and popular watches (Japy), remaining a bastion of tradition!

The few minutes of daily variation had no impact on the understanding of celestial mechanisms and therefore did not prevent the early association of astronomical complications, designed to calculate long-term events. It took the Italian Giovanni Dondi (1330-1388) 16 years to create a remarkable astronomical clock, a replica of which can be seen at the Musée International d’Horlogerie in La Chaux-de-Fonds (MIH).

The mainspring

• Date of invention: early 15th century. The first known example is found in the “Philippe le Bon, Duke of Burgundy” clock dating from 1430.
• Use in horology: generates kinetic energy as the spring uncoils.
• Significance: enabled the creation of portable timepieces.
• Weight: from 20 grams for the largest to less than 1 gram for watches.
• Materials used: forged steel then hardened steel, currently steel and nickel alloy (unbreakable and stainless).

In parallel, the invention of the wheellock rifle – equipped with a spiral spring to trigger the firing of the powder – led shortly afterwards to the creation of the first portable clocks. Thanks to these springs housed in barrels, the driving force of the gear train was no longer dependent on gravity but rather the torque accumulated by deforming a strip of steel housed in a cage equipped with a peripheral gear train coupled to the primary movement. Although often disputed, current historiography considers Nuremberg clockmaker Peter Henlein as the first to have developed what can be called a watch between 1480 and 1508. Equally worthy of mention, through his pioneering work, the Swiss clockmaker and mathematician Jost Bürgi (1552–1632) played an important role in transforming clocks into instruments of science.

Giovanni Dondi, Peter Henlein, Jost Bürgi

The rich and mighty appreciated objects that symbolised their power – and the portable clock fulfilled this role perfectly. Table clocks and shortly thereafter watches became as much a part of their panoply as firearms and swords. Very quickly, the nobles and bourgeoisie of the cities seized upon these portable clocks, which rapidly decreased in size to the point where they could be worn on a chain around the neck (carrying them in a pocket came much later).

The English word “watch” derives from the verb wacchen, meaning to be awake or keep watch. An outward symbol of wealth, watches from the sixteenth century until the end of the seventeenth century were more like jewellery than actual timepieces. The mechanisms of the time, incorporating a primary spring tension regulator (a stackfreed spring-loaded cam mechanism or fusee-and-chain device), relied on the verge escapement and a balance whose oscillations were maintained only by the driving force of the foliot and sometimes assisted by the presence of pig or boar bristles.

The balance spring: a major invention, the first controversy

In the mid-seventeenth century, as science progressed and the idea of precision became increasingly refined, various scientists and astronomers wondered about the most effective way to make time-measuring instruments in general and watches in particular, which were becoming increasingly numerous as well as more accurate.

Many scientists questioned their accuracy. These included Galileo, Isaac Newton, a priest from Orleans with a passion for science named Hautefeuille, as well as English mathematician and physicist Robert Hooke. All sought solutions that were more or less original or useful. It was however French physicist Blaise Pascal who in 1660 became one of the first to propose a solution for irregularities in the operation of the balance. He proposed the integration of a flat spring measuring a mere hair’s breadth and attached to the regulating balance, in order to counteract the untimely disruptions to the running of the watch caused by even the slightest shocks or sudden movement.

Galileo, Isaac Newton, Blaise Pascal

The idea of assisting the balance in its oscillations by means of an elastic component was in vogue at the time and on 23rd January, 1675, Christiaan Huygens introduced the technique of the spiral-shaped balance spring (aka hairspring). The name of this distinguished Dutch scientist has remained as the inventor of this small revolution, but also as one of the protagonists of the first real controversy concerning the authorship of a major invention. The fact of incorporating a spiral-shaped spring coupled at its inner end to the balance and at its outer end to an organ serving to modify the moment of inertia of the group thus constituted was to bring about a real revolution in terms of accuracy. The same revolution that the very same mathematician had brought about a few years earlier by introducing the free-sprung balance for clocks.

Christiaan Huygens

It should be noted that Huygens took advantage of Hooke and Hautefeuille’s technical contributions to promote his own findings at the right moment. Undoubtedly somewhat opportunistic, with such a small component he sparked the most important revolution before the invention of the quartz regulator. In less than a year, all old-fashioned watches became obsolete or were modified to adapt to the invention that transformed an aesthetically beautiful yet fallible watch – accurate to within an hour in calculating daily time – into one showing a deviation of barely five minutes per day.

Regulating balance spring for verge escapement

• Date of invention: 1675
• Use in horology: to render the oscillations of the balance as isochronous as possible and to free the balance from the influence of flaws in the gear train, thereby enabling watches to function regularly and, therefore, give the correct time, or almost so, by constantly adjusting the balance’s rotational amplitude.
• Weight: always less than 0.05 gram.
• Type: generally flat, helical for marine chronometers, with a Breguet or Philipps terminal curve for precision watches.
• Materials used: historically, laminated, flame-blued and tempered steel wire. Some makers experimented with glass (Arnold & Dent). Contemporary balance springs can be in Nivarox, a stainless nickel steel alloy, or Elinvar, a treated steel alloy that exhibits constant elasticity at all temperatures. Rolex has its own alloy, as does Seiko. Balance springs are also made in silicon and, since September 2025, in carbon by TAG Heuer.

Hours, minutes, seconds: a new era

Watchmaking made a considerable leap forward in terms of accuracy with Huygens’ invention. It took less than ten years for master watchmakers to introduce this invention into watches (without major modifications) and to create new instruments. These were equipped with a hand for reading elapsed minutes in addition to the hours indicator, notably thanks to the work of British watchmaker Daniel Quare in the late seventeenth century. A few decades later, around the time of the French Regency (1715-1721), the seconds hand made its appearance on watch dials, especially English ones.

Great Britain was in the early years of an industrial revolution that would enable it to gain an intellectual and technical advantage over its main rival, France. However, one challenge continued to curb its progress, if only in terms of travel: mastering the calculation of longitude. Sailors had long known how to measure latitude at sea and the use of compasses meant that convoys sailing to the Americas or the Indies did not stray too far off course. However, in order to venture beyond known sea routes, they still needed to master the calculation of longitude. In 1714, the Longitude Act passed by the British Parliament offered £20,000 to anyone who could find a solution to calculating longitude at sea.

The minute hand

• Date of invention: circa 1690, becoming widespread on watches between the late 17th and early 18th century.
• Weight: from several dozen kilograms for clocks to less than 0.2 gram for a classic watch.
• Type: multiple shapes; in the classic configuration, they are mounted above the hour hands, friction-fitted on the cannon pinion.
• Materials used: steel, gold, silver, brass, currently luminescent using non-radioactive materials (Super-LumiNova®, Traser®, etc.).

In 1725 Isaac Newton observed that “a good watch may serve to keep a reckoning at Sea for some days and to know the time of a Celestial Observation; and for this end a good Jewel watch may suffice till a better sort of Watch can be found out.” The solution was found by John Harrison, a young cabinetmaker and self-taught clockmaker from Barrow upon Humber, who set about building a marine chronometer after learning of the prize offered by the London Parliament. Harrison won the award after years of struggle against Reverend Nevil Maskelyne, a fervent advocate of the astronomical solution and head of the Board of Longitude. In achieving this feat, he proved that a beautifully designed watch with a high-quality escapement could tell the time with acceptable accuracy.

Nevil Maskelyne, John Harrison, George Graham

From then on, English, French and later Swiss watchmakers set about incorporating into ordinary watches the solutions proposed by this self-taught man and others who followed him in this race for precision. In addition to these advances, one should also mention the invention of jewelled bearings in watchmaking. This invention is credited to Nicolas Fatio, a Swiss mathematician born in Basel in 1664, who began using them in 1700. Aware of the significance of his invention, he travelled to London to make the most of it with the help of two French watchmakers, Pierre and Thomas Debaufre.

To protect himself from fraud, he applied for a patent in England, which he obtained on 1st May, 1704. The secret of drilling hard stones was closely guarded and enabled English watchmaking to make considerable progress in the field of precision during the Age of Enlightenment.

Jewelled bearings for pivots

• Date of invention: 1700, patent granted on 1st May, 1704 to Nicolas Fatio.
• Significance: still in use today, jewels significantly reduce friction between the plate and the pivots of the moving parts (wheels) or the balance. The bearing’s recess or sink also serves to retain the lubricant for a longer period of time.
• Weight: less than 0.01 gram per unit, with an average diameter of 0.2 mm to 1.5 mm and a hole diameter of 0.05 to 0.12 mm.
• Materials used: natural ruby or sapphire until 1901, sometimes diamonds for the counter pivots. Since 1901, watchmakers have been using synthetic corundum (hardness of 9 on the Mohs scale of 10) coloured with iron oxide and laser-drilled.

British precision

Watches still lacked a new-generation regulating mechanism that would be more effective than the verge escapement that had been in use for two centuries. During this period, the most accomplished creators of new escapements for watches and clocks were undoubtedly English. Robert Hooke worked on the development of a free-sprung escapement that was to become a lever escapement after George Graham and then Thomas Mudge had themselves developed their work in this direction.

The ingenious system of thermal compensation for watch balances brought the precision that had been lacking when significant temperature changes occurred. John Harrison, for one, perfectly understood the adverse effects which the expansion of metal had on a movement. A talented manufacturer, he produced a complex “gridiron” system of brass and steel rods directly connected to the balance spring. It was clever yet very cumbersome and another means had to be found. Pierre Le Roy proposed a solution with his marine clock in 1766 which, as well as being a detached escapement escapement that was revolutionary for the time (a kind of first-generation lever escapement), featured a compensation system acting directly on the moment of inertia of the balance, connected for the first time to an isochronous balance spring.

The compensation balance

• Date of invention: Development began in 1755 by Pierre Le Roy for simple compensation, followed by Arnold in 1780 for the compensated bimetallic balance and Earnshaw in 1781.
• Scope: automatic temperature compensation by the balance improved the accuracy of watches equipped with this feature.
• Weight: from around 10 grams for marine chronometers to less than 0.5 gram for a high-quality watch.
• Use in watchmaking: the Guillaume bimetallic balance disappeared from production and was replaced by the new self-compensating and thermally stable Nivarox/Glucydur balance/spring “assortments”.
• Materials used: steel and laminated brass, cut balance, adjustment screw on the outside of the balance. Currently: beryllium bronze.

At the same time, and no doubt spurred on by the advances made by the English masters, the Duke of Praslin sent the talented Ferdinand Berthoud – a watchmaker originally from Neuchâtel (then part of Prussia) who had become a French citizen – to observe their developments with a view to countering the English in the race for longitude.

Horologists had however already gained a head start in this field. Brilliant watchmaker John Arnold laid the foundations for modern chronometry in 1765 and developed highly innovative escapements and balances. His competitor at the time, the accomplished yet impoverished Thomas Earnshaw, invented in 1782 the escapement that is still considered by many to be the most efficient today: the detent escapement (with a compression-based escape-wheel). He also laid the foundations for what are now known as bimetallic cut-rim compensated balances.

Deadbeat escapements

• Pivoted escapement developed by John Arnold in 1775, modified to a spring escapement in 1781 by the same watchmaker.
• Spring detent with escape wheel acting in compression proposed by Thomas Earnshaw in 1781.
• This model would ultimately be used by all marine chronometer-makers from 1800 onwards.

These advances in the cutting-edge maritime sector – which was then setting out to conquer the Pacific – were nonetheless slow in filtering down to the watch industry. It wasn’t until 1823 that Swiss watchmaking began using a watch jewel manufactured in La Chaux-de-Fonds by a production set-up imported by Pierre-Frédéric Ingold, a former worker for Abraham-Louis Breguet. At the same time, the most ingenious watchmakers conducted numerous experiments to create escapements that were less expensive to produce and above all less sensitive than those of the spring detent variety, while remaining just as accurate.

Thomas Mudge, a brilliant designer and student of George Graham, proposed a lever escapement that took years to catch on. For his part, George Graham introduced the cylinder escapement, which John Arnold and then Abraham-Louis Breguet would adopt, incorporating a ruby tuile to reduce friction. Meanwhile, inventive watchmakers such as Pierre Jaquet-Droz (followed by Henri-Louis Jaquet Droz and Jean-Frédéric Leschot) developed automata endowed with incredible mechanisms that delighted European courts. Others, such as Jean-François Bautte around 1800, also offered luxury products based on horological mechanisms to the great figures of the time.

Pierre Jaquet-Droz, Jean-François Bautte

European courts were powerful drivers in the development of national and dynastic watchmaking industries from which some names remain to this day, such as Urban Jürgensen in Denmark and Carl Suchy & Söhne (Austria). A key figure of this prolific era was Jacques-Frédéric Houriet, a master of accuracy who delivered across Europe from his base in Le Locle, laying the foundations for a form of industrialised production while exchanging ideas with many of his peers.

Urban Jürgensen, Jacques-Frédéric Houriet

Geneva became a centre for what would later be known as “haute horlogerie" (fine watchmaking), with its cabinetmakers gathered around Manufactures such as the one created by Jean-Marc Vacheron in 1755. The latter succeeded in series-producing high-quality movements for richly decorated models, often intended for these same courts (see this issue’s cover story). Not to mention Voltaire, who set up his watchmaking workshops on the outskirts of Geneva and supplied timepieces to his friend Catherine the Great of Russia – or, from the Val-de-Travers, the Bovet brothers, who supplied the Chinese court via London in the early nineteenth century. Near Geneva, the Vallée de Joux also became a stronghold of “grand complication” watches (Audemars Piguet, Jaeger-LeCoultre).

Jean-Marc Vacheron, Voltaire

Lever escapement

• Date of invention: 1759 by Thomas Mudge (1715-1794), English watchmaker and student of George Graham.
• Significance: the most suitable mechanism for series production of watch movements with free-sprung escapements.
• Weight: approximately 0.1 gram with ruby pallets.
• Use in watchmaking: transmits the force of the gear train to the balance via the escape wheel. The escapement is called free-sprung because there is no contact between the balance and the pallet-lever during most of the oscillation. The result is less friction and therefore more regular operation.
• Materials used: hardened steel or brass (hard brass) for the pallet-lever, genuine ruby pallets for antique watches or watches without pallets (hardened and polished steel levers). Versions known as pin versions (standard alarm clocks). Nowadays, silicon is increasingly used.
• Currently, the only lever model still in production among the more than 50 possible variants is the “Swiss” lever model with “shared impulses”. Reliable and robust over the very long term, this system is recognised for its high quality and has supplanted all other existing forms.

At the turn of the nineteenth century, watchmaking – which had embarked on an industrial approach following work undertaken as of 1777 by Frenchman Frédéric Japy – ultimately chose two escapements that had proven their worth and yielded fairly good results without being too expensive to produce: the cylinder (friction) escapement and the lever (free-sprung) escapement. All other concepts, however original or visionary they may have been, were destined to disappear in the long run (natural escapement, virgule escapement, double-virgule escapement, Duplex escapement, De Bethune escapement, pivot escapement, etc.).

These regulators needed to be combined with high-quality balances in order to reveal their full potential. Initially, these were bimetallic balances with cut rims and compensation weights. This sensitive and expensive component required considerable skill both in its production and in its final adjustment. This highly precise task was performed mainly by women: in 1930, 90% of the workforce employed to adjust balance springs and fine-tune the balance were women. The twentieth century would see women emerge from behind the scenes, whether as entrepreneurs such as Betty Fiechter (Blancpain) or designers such as Jacqueline Dimier (Audemars Piguet). During the 1920s and 1930s, manufacturers adopted an alloy developed by Charles-Edouard Guillaume. The balance wheels of yesteryear disappeared, replaced by those made of Glucydur (a bronze-beryllium alloy). Today’s inertia balances still have screws that are used for dynamic adjustment. This is the case at Patek Philippe (Gyromax), Rolex (Microstella) and increasingly at other manufacturers.

Making time measurement more reliable

In the late eighteenth century, watches by renowned master watchmakers worked perfectly yet required fairly regular maintenance. Sensitive to humidity and not very dust-proof due to the handling required to wind the watch and set the time, the movement quickly lost its timekeeping qualities.

All the great watchmakers questioned the reliability and ease of use of their creations. Around 1776, Liège-based watchmaker Hubert Sarton developed an automatic winding mechanism with a central oscillating weight to free pocket-watch owners from the tedious task of winding with a key.

Hubert Sarton, Abraham-Louis Perrelet, Abraham-Louis Breguet

Talented watchmakers such as Abraham-Louis Perrelet and his student, the famous Abraham-Louis Breguet (who went on to design his own system inspired by the pedometers widely used by the military at the time), offered innovative and original solutions to a wealthy clientele. While many have thought that this system was an invention in itself, it should above all be viewed as a discovery linked to the desire to dispense with a tool for winding watches. Although intelligent solutions, they were not really successful. Why? That remains a mystery. It would take a century and a half for the automatic winding mechanism to become a popular and almost unique standard in the consumption of watch products.

The measurement of intervals was refined in the early nineteenth century, with work on compteurs de tierces carried out by the great scientist Louis Moinet, who also wrote treatises on watchmaking that became references in the field, as well as the ink-dot “chronographs” proposed by Nicolas Mathieu Rieussec, a term that has since become widespread.

Louis Moinet, Nicolas Mathieu Rieussec, Antoine LeCoultre

Others such as Antoine LeCoultre developed mechanisms enabling micron-level measurements. When it comes to keyless winding mechanisms, Thomas Prest developed one in 1820 for John Roger Arnold, as did Breguet in 1821 in Paris, and then Adolphe Nicole in 1844 in London. History has recorded Adrien Philippe, Norbert de Patek’s partner in the manufacture of high-quality timepieces, as the inventor of this now common mechanism. It should be noted that until wristwatches became widespread, automatic winding was always considered to be of very limited use for pocket watches which, since 1880, were all equipped with keyless winding.

The widespread use of wristwatches in the trenches of World War I and their reuse thereafter (such as the iconic Tank designed by Louis Cartier) revealed several technical challenges that watchmakers had to overcome in order to establish this way of wearing watches – a trend that would further intensify during the Art Deco years.

Louis Cartier, Adrien Philippe, Norbert de Patek

The year was 1920 and watchmaking industrialisation was in full swing. The Swiss (and the French, led by LIP) dominated the market and no one could outshine them – not even the major manufacturers across the Atlantic such as Waltham, Elgin and Hamilton, who had caused them so much concern with their industrial capabilities in the nineteenth century. Switzerland proved capable of responding, moving from the traditional établissage system (in which production and assembly were split among various specialised artisans working from home) to pooling skills in Manufactures under the impetus of entrepreneurs such as Georges Favre-Jacot (Zenith), Ernest Francillon (Longines) and the Brandt family (Omega). It also meant taking advantage of hydraulic energy to power their industrial facilities, such as Florentine Ariosto Jones, who came from the United States and founded IWC on the banks of the Rhine.

César Brandt, Georges Favre-Jacot, Ernest Francillon

For their part, the Germans developed a dedicated watchmaking centre in Glashütte, near Dresden, of which the founding fathers Friedrich Gutkaes, Ferdinand Adolf Lange and Moritz Grossmann were followed by visionaries such as Alfred Helwig, who in the 1920s developed the now very common flying tourbillon mechanism. The Black Forest was also an important hub, with Junghans being one of the world’s largest watch manufacturers in the early twentieth century. As an everyday object, the watch continued its slow progress in terms of quality without finding new outlets. In order to bring real added value in terms of use, watchmakers focused on watch cases’ water-resistance. When worn on the wrist, a watch is much more exposed to moisture and shocks than its counterpart kept snugly inside a pocket.

Ferdinand Adolf Lange, Friedrich Gutkaes, Moritz Grossmann

Between 1918 and 1930, several European and American brands – with the help of various case and crown specialists (Borgel, Depollier, Perregaux & Perret) – launched their proposals for sturdy wristwatches in response to demand that still represented a minority, yet was steadily growing, with pocket watches accounting for half of all sales. This highly productive interwar period, which laid the foundations for the reliability, ease of use and widespread adoption of the wristwatch, also saw advances in the development of self-winding movements – just as back in the 18th century (Leroy, Harwood).

Betty Fiechter, Hans Wilsdorf

In this race to offer modern and relevant products, it was Hans Wilsdorf (1881-1960), the creator of the Rolex brand, who came out on top, integrating a simple and efficient mechanical self-winding movement (1931) into the most effective waterproof case ever made (1926), combined with strategic promotional campaigns and capitalising on the exclusivity of innovation through the protective mechanisms offered by a rapidly developing intellectual property system.

Image and productivity

The “brand with the coronet” enjoyed global success after World War II, when the pre-eminence of self-winding waterproof wristwatches was confirmed. This success was further reinforced after the great quartz crisis, having shifted its focus to turning its reliable models and firmly established collections into status symbols, while its competitors remained focused on the pursuit of precision. The playing field had changed, ushering in the era we know today, in which watches are objects of desire that transcend – yet do not neglect – their utilitarian function.

Whereas prior to World War II, a good half of all watches were still carried in the pocket, by the dawn of the 1950s, all brands were capitalising on wristworn timepieces, which accounted for 80% of demand. All watches therefore had to be sufficiently waterproof, robust and sturdy to target this new clientele, whose lifestyles and sporting activities were becoming more diverse.

To appeal to these demanding consumers and young people seeking sporting experiences, Swiss brands – from Blancpain to Heuer and Longines, as well as Omega, Tissot and Breitling – turned to inspirational fields: they celebrated travel through aviation, diving, mountaineering, space exploration, motor racing, and more. The chronograph took on a more prominent role (through specialists such as Minerva).

Auguste Verneuil

Innovations that arrived at the dawn of the twentieth century, such as the synthetic sapphire developed by Auguste Verneuil, made it possible to increase quality production. With a hardness of 9 on the Mohs scale, this type of sapphire can only be scratched by itself or by diamond. Jaeger-LeCoultre was a pioneer in its use, both for calibres and for the crystal protecting the dial. In 1931 it used it for the Reverso Lady and certain versions of the Duoplan. Since then, virtually all contemporary watches have been fitted with sapphire crystal instead of hesalite, plexiglass or even the glass used for spectacle lenses.

Sapphire crystal

• Date of invention: 1900 by Auguste Verneuil.
• Significance: production of movement jewels and protective watch crystals. With a hardness rating of 9 on the Mohs scale, this mineral can only be scratched by itself or by diamond.
• Materials used: aluminium and chromium oxide heated in a crucible to 2,000°C. The drops formed are deposited on a base and crystallise. Their accumulation on the base produces a long cylindrical crystal, called a boule (due to its ball-like appearance).
• Currently used extensively in watchmaking for the production of protective glass. Robust and virtually scratch-proof, sapphire crystal requires no special maintenance and helps to preserve the watch’s attractive appearance.
• This synthetic sapphire is also used in the production of watch jewels.

In the 1940s, the “shock absorbers” or “shock protectors” dear to Abraham-Louis Breguet became widespread in wristwatches (Incabloc in 1938). Since then, it would be unthinkable to do without them, to the point that some companies have their own systems. In the same spirit of production rationalisation, bimetallic balances and blued steel balance springs were gradually replaced by new-generation assemblies incorporating alloys (Elinvar, Nivarox, etc.) for the balance springs and beryllium bronze for the oscillator.

Meanwhile, watchmakers were working on technologies that had long been known but were still unsuitable for small-volume watchmaking...

Chronometric revolution

While the majority of engineering departments were striving to improve the reliability of mechanical wristwatches, some design departments were already, in the late 1930s, working to develop mechanisms inspired by those of electromechanical marine chronometers and master clocks used in industry and railways.

In 1932 Lack Horton and Morrison used the first quartz for Bell Telephone in the United States, but it was John Harcourt Gibbs who produced the first quartz-controlled clock in 1936. Nearly 30 years later, in 1964, a quartz clock measuring less than 200 cubic centimetres made its first appearance. In 1957 the first button cells for electro-mechanical wristwatches were introduced, such as the Ventura by Hamilton and the LIP Nautic-Ski by Fred Lip (Ucar 201 and Everready 201 carbon-zinc).

Fred Lip, Max Hetzel

Thanks to these powerful batteries, Swiss engineer Max Hetzel – inventor of the “high-frequency tuning fork” resonator that had been turned down in Switzerland and France – enabled the American company Bulova to create the famous Accutron. In 1965 the first lithium batteries were launched, followed in 1980 by silver oxide versions (Renata at ASUAG).

Shortly afterwards, Seiko and the Centre Electronique Horloger (CEH) presented prototypes of quartz watches; then at Christmas 1969, Seiko launched the Astron (an analogue quartz watch) on the market. During subsequent editions of the Basel Fair, several brands offered their electronic models: Seiko with the Astron 35SQ, Longines with the Ultraquartz 6512, the CEH with the Beta-2 calibre, Girard-Perregaux with the GP 350 and Hamilton with the Pulsar. That particular year also saw the appearance of the first mechanical self-winding chronograph calibres (Seiko, Heuer-Breitling Leonidas, Zenith).

The quartz revolution was beginning and would wreak havoc among traditional watchmakers, who were facing three other challenges at the same time. The first was the rise of a new generation who, in 1968, had rejected their parents’ vision and way of life. Secondly, there were the economic effects of the first oil crisis and, thirdly, the ability of emerging computer manufacturers (Casio, IBM, Texas Instruments, Seiko-Epson and many others) to become watchmakers and flood the market with contemporary, low-cost instruments, particularly with the arrival of LCD (Liquid Crystal Display) technology in 1973. As much as the technological disruption itself, this revolution highlighted the shortcomings of traditional watchmaking’s rigid structures in terms of both productivity and adaptability.

Gérald Genta, Jacqueline Dimier

At the same time, as if to defy this fast-changing world, a few luxury brands commissioned Gérald Genta to design watches with more contemporary lines (leading, among others, to Audemars Piguet’s Royal Oak and Patek Philippe’s Nautilus). Actively seeking solutions to bounce back and emerge from the crisis, traditional brands launched various projects which met with varying degrees of success.

Yoshikazu Akahane

Among all the possible options, one should note the arrival of auto-quartz movements worked on by the Swiss (ASUAG) and the Japanese (Seiko) in 1975. At the same time, Seiko engineer Yoshikazu Akahane developed the principle of a contemporary hybrid escapement using quartz but without the need for a battery. The resulting Spring Drive mechanismwas developed in 1976 and officially launched in an automatic version in 2004.

Spring Drive hybrid escapement

• Date of invention: 1976 by Seiko engineer Yoshikazu Akahane.
• Scope: this type of 100% mechanical calibre is equipped with a tri-synchro regulator, a processor that regulates the rotation of the balance wheel by slowing it down electro-mechanically. It took 28 years of continuous research to develop.
• How it works: as the balance rotates, it generates electricity that vibrates a calibrated quartz crystal which, coupled with a processor, regulates the rotation of the balance by slowing it down or releasing it electro-mechanically so that it makes exactly 28,800 rotations per hour.
• Today, it offers a guarantee of accuracy that is almost ten times greater than that of a traditional mechanical movement, with a gain or loss of around 15 seconds per month – and the new generation is expected to show a deviation of around 20 seconds per year.

Changing the message

At the same time, the market for classic watches was unable to withstand the flood of low-cost, fashionable models. Traditional Swiss and French brands disappeared one after the other, unable to bounce back at the right moment... But could they have done so?

The late 1970s and early 1980s marked a real turning point in the industry. By 1982, the number of watchmaking jobs in the Jura region had been halved compared to 1972. However, a small revolution was brewing in the ETA workshops, inspired by an observation made by the company’s chief engineer Jacques Muller in the summer of 1980 – but which in fact stemmed from market research and the emergence of competition from the Asian market. The idea shared with Elmer Mock and ETA’s boss Ernst Tomke was quite simple: to offer an analogue quartz watch that was affordable (around CHF 50), versatile and even playful, water-resistant and... disposable!

Nicolas George Hayek, Jacques Muller, Elmer Mock, Ernst Tomke

The company needed to be able to compete with the Japanese on their own turf by offering solutions, tailored to a market that was at its lowest ebb, to new generations waiting for something revolutionary. At the same time, the company presented the ultra-thin “Delirium” quartz calibre. This was to pave the way for industrial recovery, as the Tissot watch had done, thanks to an idea now widely used in the field of fine watchmaking: using the caseback as a constituent part of the movement and streamlining production by limiting costs and components.

Launched on the American market in 1982, Swatch was to be the cornerstone of the revival of Swiss watchmaking, which was suffering from a crisis that it was unable to manage using traditional methods. Enter Nicolas George Hayek. In the 1980s, this Lebanese-born entrepreneur who had become a Swiss citizen was tasked with auditing the Swiss watch industry, which was unable to compete with Asian rivals. His assessment of the industry was alarming: he decided to merge SSIH, which owned Omega and Tissot, with ASUAG, a group that included Longines, Rado and movement manufacturer ETA SA.

It was during this merger that he found the solution to revive the Swiss watch industry at ETA SA, thanks to the work then underway on the Swatch (a contraction of Switzerland and Watch, or the combination of the words Second and Watch). The product – with its injection-moulded plastic case and simple manufacturing process, doubtless inspired by the Tissot Astrolon or Idea 2000, which in 1971 was ten years ahead of its time and had virtually everything that made the Swatch so successful – was intended to revitalise the profession. It was also designed to rekindle the interest of a younger generation in collecting fun watches with a classic design and analogue display.

Philippe Stern, Günter Blümlein, Jean-Claude Biver

At the other end of the price spectrum, the watchmaking revival was also due to visionary entrepreneurs such as Günter Blümlein (IWC and A. Lange & Söhne in the 1990s), Philippe Stern (owner of Patek Philippe) and Jean-Claude Biver, who was instrumental in revitalising and exporting the prestige of Swiss watches globally, as vectors for a powerful emotional message. By uniting an important watchmaking heritage and undertaking ambitious cultural initiatives, they helped rekindle collectors’ interest in mechanical wristwatches, encouraging brands to gradually resume production in the mid-1980s. Organised by Dr Helmut Crott in Germany and Osvaldo Patrizzi at Antiquorum, themed auctions supported this revival, which was confirmed by the watch industry entries and investments by major luxury groups (Richemont, LVMH). One should also mention jewellery watches, which take watchmaking into another realm of expression (Piaget, Van Cleef & Arpels, Chopard).

Dr Helmut Crott, Osvaldo Patrizzi

Custodians of tradition

During the years when the crisis was raging, a few diehard watchmakers held fast and in the absence of work provided by brands that were then in dire straits, decided instead to restore collectible watches – and in some cases to create new ones to meet the expectations of a few wealthy collectors.

Among these artisans, determined to preserve the expertise of a craft that some believed had all but disappeared, were pioneers and apprentices who, inspired by these determined master craftsmen, decided to follow in their footsteps. As surprising as it may seem, in 1975 some of the greatest proponents of this profession that no one imagined would make such a strong comeback were once again... Anglo-Saxons!

George Daniels, Derek Pratt

While it is impossible to name all those involved in this revival, Englishmen Derek Pratt and George Daniels certainly deserve a mention. The latter is the better known of the two, having published books promoting the craft and helping to inspire a new generation of artisans. He also developed a new escapement, the Co-Axial, which Omega acquired from him and installed in its movements ten years after he had reworked it.

Co-Axial escapement

• Date of invention: 1974-75 by George Daniels.
• Significance: a new concept in watch escapements, halfway between a lever and a detent system, it delivers a better impulse to the balance, reduces friction and requires very little lubrication of the escapement components, thereby reducing maintenance.
• Weight: approximately 0.3 gram for the escape wheel, co-axial escapement and balance.
• Materials used: steel and ruby.
• Developed for series production in partnership with Omega after ten years of research.

In Switzerland, fiercely independent watchmakers such as Vincent Calabrese, Svend Andersen, Daniel Roth, Philippe Dufour or Antoine Preziuso – as well as Gerd-Rüdiger Lang and Bernhard Lederer in Germany – revitalised the profession by offering original, handcrafted creations. Launched in 1985, the Académie des Créateurs Horlogers Indépendants, unites many of these steadfast devotees of fine mechanical watchmaking in an era dominated by electronics.

Svend Andersen, Philippe Dufour, Vincent Calabrese, Daniel Roth, Gerd-Rüdiger Lang, Bernhard Lederer, Antoine Preziuso

At the same time, to maintain demand for rare timepieces, Pascal Courteault, industrialist and owner of Leroy watches and Voisin automobiles, joined forces with François-Paul Journe (founder of Manufacture F.P. Journe) and Denis Flageollet (founder of Manufacture De Bethune) to establish THA (Technologie Horlogère Appliquée) in 1989. Specialising in the production of exceptional timepieces and complicated calibres for a discerning clientele and prestigious brands, THA provided a springboard for a number of artisans who have become leading lights in the resurgent industry. The likes of Franck Muller, Vianney Halter and Thomas Baumgartner.

François-Paul Journe, Denis Flageollet, Vianney Halter, Franck Muller

Other more discreet artisans opted to work in the restoration trade, such as Michel Parmigiani before the Sandoz family encouraged him to launch his brand in the 1990s. Among the figures who contributed to the revival of the profession were visionaries such as engineer Ludwig Oechslin, who proposed original and futuristic developments for the Ulysse Nardin brand. In their own way, watchmakers Dominique Renaud and Giulio Papi also helped to give fresh impetus to the profession. The same is true of Maximilian Büsser, who launched the Opus series when he was head of Harry Winston’s watch division, before founding his experimental brand MB&F, which is helping to “deconstruct” watchmaking in order to reinvent it with a fresh, ultra-contemporary vision.

Dominique Renaud, Ludwig Oechslin, Michel Parmigiani, Maximilian Büsser

Today, new masters are serving as catalysts for the passion of a new generation of watchmakers. One naturally thinks of Felix Baumgartner who, by co-founding Urwerk with Martin Frei, foreshadowed the trend of what has since 2000 been dubbed “new watchmaking”; as well as Robert Greubel and Stephen Forsey in the field of mechanical innovation. Among these freethinkers, Richard Mille – along with Dominique Guenat – has demonstrated that anything is possible in this profession, even the unimaginable. In short, without presenting all members of this new-gen roster of talents, it is clear that, from Kari Voutilainen to Rexhep Rexhepi and Roger W. Smith, the independent scene is experiencing a new golden age. Further proof of this renewed interest in the legacy of artisanal watchmaking is the revival of historical names, from Universal Genève to Czapek & Cie, Favre-Leuba and Nivada Grenchen.

Martin Frei, Felix Baumgartner, Robert Greubel, Stephen Forsey

Let us hope that this wonderful emulation continues. It has held its own in the face of the arrival of smartwatches, which could have replicated the crisis that the industry experienced during the 1970s and 1980s. However, the market has evolved and the challenges facing mechanical watches are no longer the same. Their salvation undoubtedly lies in the fact that they have gone from being everyday objects to jewellery. Having regained their stature as ceremonial instruments, they are returning to their initial function, the longest in their long history: that of serving as a status symbol, a tool with the formidable power to deliver the message that its owner wishes to convey to others.

Richard Mille, Dominique Guenat, Kari Voutilainen, Roger W. Smith, Rexhep Rexhepi