Belying its plain face and minimalist style, up to three hundred minute individual parts, hand made and assembled, form the true masterpiece of engineering which is the mechanical watch.

Despite the fact that today, enormous nuclear devices measure time to degrees of accuracy unimagined by these early time keepers, only a handful of companies, steeped in the traditions of the Swiss industry, still possess the expertise necessary to create fine examples of the watchmakers art. Most of these companies have long been prestigious leaders of the Swiss trade, however, one name which is at the forefront of a renaissance of the traditional art; was all but forgotten many years ago. Only fifteen years since it was rescued from obscurity, Blancpain, the oldest watch brand in Switzerland and thus the world, is again displaying the exquisite refinement and artistry that characterises the work of the true masters of watchmaking.

"Fifteen years ago, Blancpain was nothing; a forgotten name.' says Jean-Claude Biver, Managing Director and part-owner of Blancpain. "My partner Jaques Piguet and I acquired the rights to the Blancpain name in 1983 in order to revive the traditions of the watchmaking art. At the top level of this field there has been stability for more than one hundred years and yet in fifteen years we have broken in and Blancpain is now regarded as one of the top three brands. Our intention was to produce exclusively, the six traditional movements that a watchmaker must achieve in order to become recognised as a master of his trade.'

The first watch released in 1983 was an automatic wristwatch showing three phases of the moon which is one of the most traditional watch designs and is second in the ascending order of difficulty for watchmakers. In 1988, after years of research, Blancpain succeeded in making a watch which has never been achieved before: an automatic chronograph with date and split second hand. In the same year Blancpain launched an automatic wrist watch with a chronography that is the thinnest in the world. These movements are the very summit of the art and tradition of watchmaking.

"To appreciate the complexity of a mechanical watch, one must understand these movements," says Jacques Piguet. "We begin with an engine which is the base of everything we do. It provides the measure of time; the hours, minutes and seconds and on top of that we add complications, such as a calendar which shows the date, the month and perhaps the phases of the moon. We may add a perpetual calendar which is designed to change months on the twenty-eighth day or the thirtieth, depending on the month of the year. Every complication means a new system of mechanical gearing which is added to the watch, the most complicated being the minute repeater which is a set of hammers and gongs which chime the hours and minutes. The entire engine plus complications must of course fit into the basic watch case, and to achieve this some of the parts we make must be thinner than a single human hair.

Both partners in Blancpain have been involved in the Swiss watch trade for many years - in fact Jacques Piguet grew up in the industry. His father is the ebauche manufacturer, Frederic Piguet and he is the descendant of the great watch deisgner Louise-Elisee Piguet. Jean-Claude Biver worked first as Sales Manager for the first of Audermars-Piguet and then for Omega where he reached the position of Vice-President before leaving to devote his efforts to Blancpain.

Although born in Luxembourg, Jean-Claude Biver maintains that he is now just as committed to the culture and traditions of the Swiss trade as those whose families have been involved with watchmaking for generations. "The foreigner who acquaires a nationality is very ofter more nationalistic than the people who are born in the country," he explains. "The mechanical movements is the heritage of the Swiss industry and is part of the culture of Switzerland and this has become my personal passion."

It was during his time at Omega that Jean-Claude Biver discovered Blancpain. Omega had bought the rights to the name in 1969, when the Swiss industry was still in turmoil after the development of the electronic quartz movement. Although pioneered by the Swiss, in the hands of the Japanese the quartz movement revolutionised the industry world-wide and for many years the Swiss trade struggled to find a niche in the new quartz era. Omega acquiried Blancpain, not to continue production, but to acquire the technical knowledge it afforded, thus the name Blancpain soon disappeared from the market for the first time in almost 250 years.

"For many years the whole industry was obsessed with the quartz movement," says Jean-Claude Biver. "Whenever there is such a widespread revolution, a mood develops that questions the quality and value of what is being produced. We believed that people would be interested in a fine mechanical watch because it represents the art and heritage of our industry as well as providing real technical value. With some quartz watches there can be a disproportion between the price of the finished watch and the movement inside.

"I was looking for a brand name that had been synonymous with a certain level of quality and one which was associated with the heritage of watchmaking. Of course, Blancpain, more than satisfied these requirements, as it is the oldest watch brand in the world. Our intention was to revive the true art of watchmaking and so, because Blancpain had virtually no remaining reputation at all, we were virtually unlimited in what we could do."

When the name first appeared on a watch is difficult to determine because even well into last century, watches often displayed on the name of a licensee and sometimes no name at all. However, the year which is now accepted as the date of establishment of the firm is 1735 when records first link the name with watchmaking.

These records refer to Jehan-Jacques Blancpain who established a workshop in the village of Villeret in the heart of the Swiss Jura near the French border. He set up his workshop on the first floor of his family's massive farmhouse which had stood on the banks of the river Suze since 1636. It is possible that Jehan Jaques was one of the two clockmakers mentioned in the demographic statistics of the village for 1725. As early as 1692 there were clockmakers living in nearby Le Locle and it became common throughout the area for farmers to work their fields during summer and spend winter months making clockparts for factories in the capital Berne or Geneva.

Jehan Jacques prabably also began making parts for pocket watechs and clocks and only later commenced production of complete watches. Even though his bueinss grew quickly and he employed a number of apprentices, the farmhouse remained the Blancpain workshop for generations to come. Jehan Jacques' grandson David Louis Blancpain, born 1765, was the first to export Blancpain watches. Whenever sufficient watches had been completed he would saddle his horse and set off to sell them in distant capitals. No doubt he received assistance on these sales trips from his "world-side" family connections - his sister-in-law is reported to have been Maire-Antoinette's hairdresser before the French Revolution.

From David-Louis Blancpain, the watch business continued to be handed down through successive generations of the Blancpain dynasty. It wasn't until 1863 that the first new factory was built and in the same year, Jules-Emile Blancpain, the sixth generation owner of Blancpain, commenced plans for another, larger factory opposite the farmhouse on the banks of the Suze. During his long career he saw the business change from a cottage industry to one which manufactuered on an industrial basis; the replacment of a key winding mechanism with the winding button; and the development of increasingly complex movements including the three quarter ligne baguette movement which paved the way for the watched of the future: wristwatches.

When Jules-Emile died in 1928 ages ninety-six the Journal Suisse d'Horlogerie published the following in an obituary:

"Obsessed by watchmaking, known as the "Wheel of Encounters," he gradually introduced the production of cylinder watches and lever watches in his home town from 1850. In 1857 he succeeded his father as head of the firm. He contributed greatly to the reputation of the firm and as early as 1869 began producing watches with winding buttons. He was regarded as a trendsetter and innovator in many fields of the watchmaking industry. At present the House of Blancpain, run by the son of the deceased, M. Emile Blancpain is, we assure, the only firm in which management has passed uninterruptedly from father to son for more than a century."

Jules -Emile's son, Frederic Emile died only four years after his father and as he had no heir, the Blancpain dynasty of watchmakers came to an end. The company was taken over by his closest colleague, one Madame Fichter, who ran the copany for almost forty years under the name "Rayville" - until it was bought by Omega in 1969.

In 1926 the company had made the first serial wristwatch with an automatic winding mechanism and in 1930 followed this first with another: an automatic wristwatch which was wound by rolling the movement back and forth in the case. Both these watches, called the "
Harwood" and "Rolls" respectively are favourites of devoted watch collectors.

A diver's watch made by the company in 1953 won the favour of Jacques-Ives Cousteau and became the standard for the French Navy and was also used by the US Navy. Blancpain had always made exclusive movements for other watch companies and three years later, in 1956, it released the smallest movement for ladies watches, called the "Lady Bird", it created near endless possibilities for making tiny, bejewelled watches and further contributed to the firm's reputation as innovative and pioneering watchmakers.

Since acquiring the rights to Blancpain from Omega, Jean Claude's goal from the start has been to build a company which in fifty years time, will be recognised as a "reference for watching making art". Therefore he will never use a quartz movement - "this is an industrial movement, not the heritage of the watch." he says - and neither will he change the look of Blancpain to follow the trends of fashion. In order to maintain a consistent image he decided to make only one watch: a round case with a white dial, into which can be placed the six traditional master movements. "We must always reject fashion and continue to make a statement," says Jean Claude. "How does fashion appear in watches? In the shape of the case and the colour of the dial and so we must adhere to the tradtional round shape and the colour must always be white as it is the nature finish. And yet it is not enough to simply produce a mechanical movement inside a round case with a white dial: we must produce the six tradtional movements . The easiest watch we produce is the basic automatic - and it is not so basic in fact, because it is the slimmest movement in the world at 1.7mm.

"The first watch we released, the moon-phase calendar movement, proved to me that people do appreciate the work we are doing and the heritage of the Swiss watch. There are other luxury watches, most notably the jeweller's watch which is not worn so much as a watch but as a piece of jewellery that just happens to tell the time. This has never been my personal passion. The prices of these watches are dependant on the jewels and the design of the case. We decided to put the value in the craftsmanship of the movement and the devotion of the true traditions of watch making. A Blancpain may not look like a 90,000 SF watch compared to a jeweller's watch, but the value is within and there are many people who appreciate this type of value. Often they are the people who like to enjoy their wealth without displaying it. I suspect that the people who most appreciate Blancpain are watchmakers who know what lies behind the masterpiece within."

In ascending order, the basic automatic is followed by the moon phase calendar movement, the perpetual calendar and then the "Tourbillon", whose transparent case displays the delicate balance wheel which counters the effect of gravity, electricity and other influences on the timing of the 'engine'. Next in order, are the extra-slim chronograph and the minute repeater.

The minute repeater is the greatest masterpiece of the collection and the result of an investment of one million Swiss francs and 10,000 hours of research. It takes approximately 790 hours of intensive work to produce a single minute repeater wristwatch which chimes the hours, quarters and minutes, according to your wishes. Months of experimentation by watchmaekrs and technicians initially failed to find the perfect metal with which to make the hammers and gongs that produce the chime. Finally, a Swedish metal made at the turn of the century produced the desired "classical" timbre.

A similar amount of research went into the creation of the split chronograph which is one of the rarest and most complex movements. With almost 300 separate parts, it is only 8.75mm thick. At present, Blancpain is the only company that offers this watch in its collection. Reminiscent of Blancpain's beginnings early in the 18th Century, the company today occupies a farmhouse in Le Brassus. This similarly spacious building was where Louis - Elisee created some of his most famous works. Only twently five watchmakers are employed full time, which seems few indeed, however considering the shortage of true masters left in the industry after the turmoil of the 1960s and 70s Blancpain has become a rare enclave in which the traditions of the industry are being continued.

Blancpain produces some five to six thousand watches each year and the company's largest market, a source of pride for Jean Claude Biver is Switzerland. "Switzerland is the home of hand made watches," he says. "Many people come to Switzerland to buy a 'real' watch and these are the people who appreciate Blancpain. We have about 250 shops around the world which is not many and we have our own agents in Hong Kong and the United States. We produce as many watches as I feel we can manage while maintaining our methods of pruduction which, of course are very labour intensive. At our present production level, I feel I still have direct contact with the people who are buying our work.

"When I started this business in 1983 we were going against the trend and yet people supported our objectives. In the first year we did 50,000 French francs which is nothing, seven years later, the turnover was twenty million American dollars and even more fifteen years on. I have a passion for perfection and in order to achieve the harmony of the whole you have to master the detail of every part. We have much work to do, but we have also achieved a great deal already and will continue to pursue our goal of becoming a reference for watchmaking ."

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