Établi Nº 1: Finished where no one looks

A dial cut by hand

The centre is turned on a rose engine in clous de Paris, about 2,300 small pyramids, then lacquered salmon so the light runs across it. The eleven indices are applied, not printed: polished bars, each set by hand on two feet.

33.0 mm dial, small seconds at six

Touch and hold the watch to look closer.

Sapphire, steel and two hands

The crystal is a box sapphire, domed and anti-reflective on both sides. Under it sit dauphine hands, faceted and polished by hand. The case is satin-brushed on its flanks, between two polished bevels.

38.5 mm across, 9.8 mm from crystal to caseback

Under the dial

Lift the dial and the finishing carries on. The mainplate is grained with perlage, overlapping circles laid one at a time on a side no owner sees. The levers that set the time are steel, straight-grained, with polished bevels.

3.30 mm below the crystal

A numbered sapphire back

Turn it over. A sapphire window sits in a steel ring engraved with the piece number, from 001 to 200. It is the only view of the movement, so the movement is finished as if it were the front.

Nº 027 of 200 shown here

Stripes, bevels, blue screws

Every bridge carries Côtes de Genève, one pass of the tool per stripe. The edges are bevelled at 45 degrees and polished until they flash like a mirror. Six rubies sit in screwed gold chatons, and each screw is heated by hand until it turns blue.

23 jewels, six in gold chatons

70 hours in one barrel

Wind the crown and the barrel stores 70 hours of power. Four wheels pass it on to a balance that swings 21,600 times an hour, steadied by a blued hairspring and fine-tuned at the swan-neck screw.

21,600 vibrations an hour

164 parts, one pair of hands

Each Établi is assembled, adjusted and cased by one watchmaker, start to finish. The movement alone takes 61 hours of hand finishing.

61 hours of finishing per movement