Established in Geneva since 1937, Chopard – which this year celebrates its 150th anniversary – also has roots in Fleurier, a village in the Val-de-Travers district of Neuchâtel. When Karl-Friedrich Scheufele, Co-President of Chopard, decided to resuscitate the company’s industrial activity, he chose Fleurier as the site for the manufacture which now equips the brand’s high-end mechanical watches with its own L.U.C. movements. Chopard’s arrival also helped to revive watchmaking in the region, which already boasted the Parmigiani and Bovet workshops. In 2004, the three firms founded the Label Qualité Fleurier that would provide the end customer with the threefold guarantee, in a single certification, of a watch that remains precise in all circumstances, with proven solidity and longevity, and finished to an exclusively high standard.
Nor did Chopard stop there. Six years after Parmigiani set up Vaucher Manufacture in 2002, also in Fleurier, Chopard laid the foundations for Fleurier Ébauches. This new structure, just a stone’s throw from the manufacture which is now home to the Chopard museum, produces the blanks (ébauches) for the movements that are a key element in the firm’s vertical integration and allow it to increase its production of movements and parts.
A patrician house, built in 1773
More recently, in September, Chopard sank its roots deeper in Fleurier with the opening of the Chopard Forum. The outbuildings of this eighteenth-century edifice, bought in 2004, had already been renovated to host cultural events and gatherings. Now the house itself has been entirely refurbished to include seven guest rooms. These are decorated with furnishings from the private collection of Karl-Friedrich Scheufele and his wife. “More and more often, journalists from around the world, in particular Asia, ask if they can visit our manufacture in Fleurier. Val-de-Travers corresponds exactly to the picture-postcard image they have of Switzerland. Even for us, this is heaven on earth. We must build on this tradition of watchmaking and on a more personalised welcome.” For Chopard’s executives, friends, admirers and the apprentices who travel from all over the world to learn about the company’s movements, Fleurier is now home from home.