News Vacheron Constantin has recently won the prestigious Geneva Watchmaking Grand Prix award for the second time. This triumph sets the seal on 250 years of history.
Some years ago, on 29 November 2001, at the very first award ceremony, the Geneva Grand Prix for Watchmaking went to Lady Kalla, a timepiece by Vacheron Constantin fashioned from a block of 18 carat white gold set with more than 120 emerald-cut white diamonds.
This year the oldest watch manufacturer still in business since its foundation in 1755, has repeated the achievement by winning the supreme award, the Geneva Grand Prix for Watchmaking 2005 Golden Hand. On 10 November, the award was presented at the Grand Théâtre in Geneva for the Tour de l'Ile model created to mark the company’s 250th anniversary. Vacheron Constantin has thus rivalled the achievement of Patek Philippe which has also won two awards in 2002 and 2003. The 2004 prize went to François-Paul Journe.
To describe the Tour de l'Ile model as a grand complication would be an understatement: with its 834 components accommodated in a case with a diameter of 47 mm and a thickness of 17.8 mm, this is the most complicated serial wristwatch ever made; it features an unprecedented combination on two faces of 16 watchmaking complications and astronomical indications, from a minute repeater to the time of sunset, to say nothing of a perpetual calendar, a second time-zone, a tourbillon device, the time equation and a representation of the firmament. This marvel required more than 10,000 hours of research and development. Only seven copies will be made and they will all be personalised by exclusive engine-turning of the dial back. On 3 April last, one of them was sold by auction at Antiquorum for the impressive sum of 1,876,250 francs.
This prize comes just in time to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the manufacture and also sets the seal on the exemplary career of Claude-Daniel Proellochs, who took over responsibility for the Genevan company in the late eighties. In the space of 17 years, under Sheikh Yamani and then as a member of the Richemont group, he has restored a brand that had fallen on hard times, to its former glory with humility and determination. He has achieved a perfect alliance of the time-honoured skills of watchmaking, jewellery and enamelling and high-end technologies. So much so that he is now able to pass on to his successor Juan-Carlos Torres one of the jewels in the crown of an industry which is certainly not lacking in first-class performers!
November 22, 2005
