With a historical past courting way back to 1847, it’s exhausting to look past the momentous day when Louis-François Cartier took over his grasp Adolphe Picard’s workshop located at 29 rue Montorgueil in Paris that has since sparked 177 years of splendour. The early days of the maison had been targeted on jewellery-making for an enviable group of royal clientele. It was not till 1904 when Monsieur Cartier’s grandson Louis Cartier created Cartier’s first wristwatch — the Santos — for his aviator pal Alberto Santos-Dumont.
Whereas the watch was meant to be a purposeful instrument for Santos-Dumont, little did Louis Cartier know that it could change into one of many pivotal icons of Cartier’s historical past and alter the maison’s trajectory. Affect of the Santos watch proliferated and — slowly however absolutely — different era-defining watch creations such because the Tonneau, Tortue, and Tank got here into existence. The ebb and move of Cartier’s watches over the a long time to return in the end necessitated their very own manufacturing facility, which lastly opened its doorways in 2001. Different amenities within the neighbouring Swiss Cantons kind the higher Cartier Watchmaking Manufacture. The primary steps of watchmaking start with Glovier, located within the Jura. Metal and gold watches are produced and assembled in Villars-sur-Glâne, situated within the canton of Fribourg, whereas Cartier’s newest applied sciences are examined in Couvet. Cartier’s Maison des Métiers d’Artwork — situated inside an outdated renovated farm — is a stone’s throw from the La Chaux-de-Fonds facility.
Nestled within the coronary heart of La Chaux-de-Fonds, Switzerland, the Cartier Manufacture stands tall as a beacon of unparalleled craftsmanship and innovation. It’s located amongst the esteemed firm, with the likes of Patek Philippe’s Crêt-du-Locle facility, the Gruebel Forsey atelier, TAG Heuer and Breitling’s manufacture and motion maestro La Joux-Perret, in and round its higher neighborhood. It ushered in a brand new period for Cartier on the flip of the millennium as varied purposeful our bodies comparable to design, manufacturing, meeting and assist had been housed below the identical roof. Nevertheless, the importance of the Cartier Manufacture goes past that, because the fusion and focus of time-honoured savoir-faire and cutting-edge expertise breathe life into the enduring Cartier watches.
Not like dusty or dilapidated workshops, the Cartier Manufacture is a state-of-the-art facility spanning 33,000m2 of house zoned for varied departments inside its metallic and glass facade. Heavy industrial machines comparable to CNC equipment are housed on the primary degree, whereas an environment-controlled cleanroom is dwelling to the calibre meeting and high quality inspection groups. Different departments within the manufacture embrace the restoration, high quality management, design, sprucing and meeting groups.
From Paper to Metallic
The lifetime of a Cartier watch begins with an thought, most of the time ephemeral — simply misplaced — than concrete. And simply as an image paints a thousand phrases, there is no such thing as a higher solution to articulate an thought than with a sketch. Armed with concepts from the advertising and marketing group, the designers interpret and translate them accordingly by means of sketches from varied angles. It’s right here the place the proliferation of creativeness and creativity comes alive. Gouache (an opaque watercolour) additional strengthens the sketches by introducing colors — comparable to colored gems set on a yellow-gold case and bezel — to an in any other case black-and-white world. A fast tidbit right here: whereas Cartier was below the tutelage of the recently-departed CEO and now chairman of Cartier Tradition & Philanthropy Cyrille Vigneron for the previous eight years, all sketches — whether or not for normal manufacturing or customized shopper orders — must be personally accredited by him. A signature on the underside proper signifies approval for the design groups to proceed with prototyping. In any other case, it’s again to the drawing blocks to refine the sketches.
Resin replicas are then created by means of 3D printing. It permits the event groups to evaluate the watch’s aesthetics, such because the curvature of the Ballon Bleu de Cartier or the suppleness of the Pasha de Cartier’s bracelet earlier than precise working prototypes are created based mostly on technical dossiers. This documentation is a essential a part of the manufacturing course of as — based mostly on the experience and expertise required — industrial processes are being correctly outlined and mapped out by the economic processes division. Moreover, it permits the processes to be simulated, checked and fine-tuned accordingly to fulfill precise manufacturing portions when they’re later outlined.
As we toured by means of the advanced, a number of attention-grabbing areas caught our consideration, spanning each conventional and forward-thinking strategies. On the archaic finish of the spectrum lies the mineral crystal shaping group, which — in response to Cartier — is an nearly misplaced ability in Switzerland. Since a good variety of Cartier’s watches are available in unconventional shapes — such because the Baignoire or famed Crash — mineral crystals are used as a substitute of sapphire crystal, given their malleability to suit these circumstances. Relatively than using machines and expertise to form the mineral crystals, an artisan does it manually with a blowtorch till they’re malleable sufficient to be formed to totally different watch mannequin specs. Inspections alongside the best way are finished with the human eye, not machines.
On the other finish of the spectrum lies the specialised equipment for devoted processes, comparable to milling and CNC machines within the bracelet manufacturing division and high quality inspection equipment. These machines employed within the former division are liable for fashioning bracelet hyperlinks from metallic bars. As much as 9 bars could be processed concurrently, with the best bracelet requiring 30 seconds per hyperlink, whereas extra advanced examples require as much as 90 seconds. Since Cartier pays shut consideration to high quality and reliability, inspections are finished all through manufacturing. An automatic four-step take a look at sees watches submerged in water and acid, and uncovered to magnetic waves and excessive temperatures to make sure they’re resistant to every aspect. If one is questioning how Cartier ascertained the reliability of its watch bracelet, there’s a machine devoted to wiggling the life out of it to make sure its structural integrity.
On the midpoint of the spectrum lies Cartier’s restoration division, which is in command of restoring classic Cartier watches and clocks. The extremely specialised division represents one of many pinnacles of Cartier’s watchmaking may, as extremely expert watchmakers revive historic items again to life. Whether or not it’s a beauty or mechanical restoration, the group employs varied strategies, from faithfully reproducing period-specific parts present in archival blueprints to devising modern options to resolve sure conundrums.
The place Splendour and Desires Come Alive
Inaugurated in 2014, Cartier’s Maison des Métiers d’Artwork is a stone’s throw away from the Cartier Manufacture. Not like the gleaming structure of the Cartier Manufacture, it takes up an outdated farm. Throughout the hallowed partitions are even older artisanal strategies teeming with custom, heritage and secrets and techniques dropped at life by means of boundless creativity and creativeness. Time is seemingly altered throughout the atelier as these age-old strategies are tailored and included into trendy executions that defy the standard codes of magnificence. Whereas there are lots of strategies, they’re divided into three important classes: the artwork of fireplace, metallic, and composition.
Enamelling — categorised below the artwork of fireplace — is a way that wants no introduction. Nevertheless, Cartier’s mastery throughout varied strategies spanning the likes of and never restricted to champlevé, cloisonné, plique a jour and grisaille enamelling deserves consideration. Enamel first exists as colored glass powders in paint kind earlier than being repeatedly fired in kilns (as much as 10 rounds of portray and firing) at totally different temperatures to set or vitrify it. Whereas enamel is usually contained within the watch dial, the Cartier Crash Tigrée Metamorphoses options enamel on its bezel, too. Right here, artisans extensively used enamelling to amplify or, at instances, complement different artisanal strategies. The nuances of color are expertly captured by means of opaque, translucent or gradated enamelling on varied surfaces comparable to silver paillettes or in engraved recesses of the stripes (also referred to as champlevé enamelling). Enamels in shades of blue and inexperienced used on this reference are achieved with cobalt oxide (for the blue) and copper oxide (for the inexperienced).
Etruscan granulation, filigree and flamed metallic are strategies that fall below the artwork of metallic. The previous dates again to 4 BC, when the Etruscan civilisation popularised the ornamental method that concerned tiny beads lining jewelry surfaces. Gold wires are first heated earlier than tiny items are minimize into water-filled crucibles. The fast cooling shapes the gold items into spheres, that are then sieved and sorted in response to measurement. Whereas soldering the beads to kind patterns is the primary utility that involves thoughts, an modern use of viscous liquid, sapphire dividers and gravity to kind the panther head define seen within the fascinating Révélation d’une Panthère is an illustration of the maison’s creativity.
Flamed metallic — one of many division’s newer Métiers d’Artwork strategies — entails heating metallic surfaces to attain totally different colors by means of oxidation. The method begins with heating the dial plate to attain a uniform blue hue earlier than undesirable elements are scratched off to create motifs of Cartier’s famed menagerie. Artisans then masks the blued portion earlier than heating the dial plates to attain totally different shades of brown starting from beige to darkish brown. Given how such oxidation processes are irreversible, the problem of the method is compounded in the direction of the later phases of flaming. It takes a talented eye and understanding of the craft to know the precise second to cease the firing course of. Cartier’s closing artwork of composition is maybe one of the vital distinctive strategies as mosaics and marquetries involving wooden, straw, flower, wooden and gold, and straw and gold come collectively to create a watch dial. Seemingly random shapes and mismatched colors are composed collectively to create summary or life like motifs.
Because the Maison des Métiers d’Artwork celebrates and displays on the previous 10 years, the artisans proceed dedicating themselves to works of magnificence and are united to fulfill the Maison des Métiers d’Artwork’s mission: to protect, innovate, and share its distinctive experience. On condition that some strategies had been on the point of extinction at one level, there may be hope that these time capsules of yesterday will likely be stored protected and handed on for generations of tomorrow.
This text was first seen on Mens Folio Singapore.
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