After 175 years, a rise in strength without moving up-market

from Europastar

January 18, 2008
By Pierre Maillard

We won’t go into detail about the long history of Longines, whose timekeeping beginnings date back to 1832 when Auguste Agassiz started his horological atelier. It was later taken over by his nephew, Ernest Francillon, who, in 1867, moved the small company to a place known as Les Longines, where fields stretched along the small Suze River.
The brand’s 175-year old history is made up of a vast fresco marked by a continuous industrial approach to the art of timekeeping. The construction and fabrication of calibres and movements is at the heart of the Longines story. This is well documented in the voluminous book, published on the occasion of this important anniversary, entitled At the Heart of an Industrial Vocation – Longines Watch Movements (1832-2007) – Tradition, Know-how, Innovation, written by a young historian, Patrick Linder, from the University of NeuchÂtel. Leafing through the volume’s more than 600 pages, we discover, step by step, the various phases of the organization and rationalization of the brand’s watch production. Longines’ entire industrial tradition, as opposed to more artisanal approaches such as those seen in the VallÉe de Joux, is explained and described in detail.

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