Ten schools of watchmaking under the loupe

While the tradition may have waned over recent decades, it is still very much remembered. The “study piece” or montre école which each student of watchmaking was required to make was, for a long time, seen as the equivalent of the masterpiece produced by journeymen in the Middle Ages. An exhibition held in 2008 and 2009 at the Musées d’Art et d’Histoire in Geneva paid tribute to these exceptional realisations.

Nor did this testimonial end there, as the curator explained at the time: “This exhibition will be accompanied by a book, the work of Antoine Simonin in Neuchâtel, with the support of the Musée de l’Horlogerie et de l’Emaillerie in Geneva. A watchmaker and teacher, training apprentice watchmakers in Switzerland and beyond, Antoine Simonin has other strings to his bow, as he is also an enthusiastic collector and a dedicated friend of museums. As a publisher specialising in books on horology, he is preparing a major work in the wake of the Geneva exhibition. Richly illustrated and drawing on contributions from numerous historians, this book will record the calibres made at Swiss watchmaking schools while tracing how these establishments have evolved.”

An original approach to watchmaking history

This book, entitled Dix écoles d’horlogerie suisses, chefs-d’œuvre de savoir-faire*, is now a reality. “Witness to developments in watchmaking instruction and work carried out in these schools, study pieces illustrate how teaching adapted to the demands of industrialised production, but also progress in technology and changes in the organisation and specialisation of the different professions. They make a special contribution to the history of Swiss watchmaking, examined here in an original light.”

The first specialist institutions were set up in the mid-nineteenth century to promote the training of fully-accomplished watchmakers who could provide the skills required by local firms. By the turn of the twentieth century, their number had grown to ten. Today, six still provide the training that is essential to the watch sector. Of these, only the Geneva school has preserved the tradition of the montre école. In this, it has the support of Chopard which worked with the school on a new movement that is the starting point for students’ piece. Other training centres envisage reviving this custom, particularly in the canton of Neuchâtel… and perhaps provide the material for a new exhibition in a hundred years’ time?

*Dix écoles d’horlogerie suisses, chefs-d’œuvre de savoir-faire
by Estelle Fallet and Antoine Simonin
published by Editions Antoine Simonin, 2010
568 pages.