KEITH W. STRANDBERG

“I love the magic of dials, as they are the face of the watch,” explains Thierry Oulevay, who in just three years has established Jean Dunand as a boutique watchmaker with the professed specialty of building one-of-a-kind timepieces. Oulevay’s partner, complications wizard Christophe Claret, may assemble the brand’s three highly complicated models—the Grand Complication, the […]

One can hardly blame François-Paul Journe for exhibiting a subtle look of self-satisfaction. In an industry that fairly worships the watchmaking geniuses of the past—like Abraham-Louis Breguet—Journe is perhaps the most prominent luminary in contemporary watchmaking. F.P. Journe’s physical plant, the only complete manufacture in the heart of Geneva, offers Journe greater control over his […]

Piaget may be the one Geneva watch company whose ties to the city’s watchmaking traditions run too deep for its own good. The Piaget name has become so associated with high jewelry and watches encrusted in precious stones, few people remember the company has an equally legitimate reputation for making movements deep in the Jura […]

Venture into the lakefront boutique of Antoine Preziuso in downtown Geneva, and you will have stumbled upon one of the Swiss watch industry’s open secrets. Preziuso doesn’t have the celebrity of today’s watchmaking virtuosos like François-Paul Journe or Michel Parmigiani. His talent, however, is in the same league. Preziuso, who has been making watches under […]

While viewing the early renderings for Jean Dunand’s latest timepiece, Thierry Oulevay, the brand’s president, took note of the futuristic design’s ancient Egyptian undertones. The watch—which combines a perpetual calendar, cathedral-gong minute repeater, moon phase, and power reserve—is particularly distinguished by three turning cylinders that, while displaying the day, date, and month, also evoke papyrus […]