Blancpain

Blancpain is a prestigious Swiss watch company part of the Swatch Group.

Today, it has the same marketing positioning « Prestige and Luxury Range » as Breguet, the other luxury brand of the group.

The brand has probably been founded in 1735 at Villeret by Jehan-Jacques Blancpain. During the watchmaking crisis of the 70’s, it became part of the SSIH. It was finally acquired and relaunched in 1983 by Jean-Claude Biver and Jacques Piguet who made of it a luxury brand, cultivating the spirit of the watchmaking tradition. When it was successful they sold it to the Swatch group.

The production of the brand is located in the village of Brassus, in the Joux valley, at the place of origin of the brand, as well as in Paudex.

In 2007, its boss is Mark A. Hayek, grandson of Nicolas Hayek.

The brand grew with the change of name of Frédéric Piguet SA to Blancpain. It was a desire of Nicolas Hayek in 2010. Blancpain is also located at Sentier (a town of the Swiss commune of the Chenit, its main town).

The casings of the brand are alway round.

Under the direction of Jean-Claude Biver, the brand has focused its communication on an intangible respect of the watch tradition and developed its technical know-how: in particular with the series of the « Six cornerstones of the Watchmaker’s Art ». Namely:

>The Ultraflat;

> The Moon phase;

> The Perpetual calendar;

> The Rattrapante Chronograph;

> The Tourbillon;

> The minutes repeater.

In 1991, the brand continued its approach towards technicality by producing the model « 1735 », which combines in the same casing the complications of the series.

Currently, the « Apothéosis temporis » series has somewhat replaced that of the « six cornerstones », by adding another two complications: second time zone and « pure equation marchante with perpetual calendar ».

One of the most famous models is the « Fifty fathoms », first diving watch, created in 1953 for the combat swimmers and waterproof at a depth of 50 fathoms, like its name indicates. One can in particular see it on the wrist of the team of the Commander Cousteau in the film « The World of Silence ».

The last version of the Fifty Fathoms , released in 2007,  is an automatic watch with 144 hours of power reserve, waterproof at 300 meters, in steel or red gold.