S.L.
5
Tribute to a great Watchmaker: Maurice Grimm
A few year ago I had the opportunity of a very special encounter with a Watchmaker whose works are admired by many - but whose name is known only to very few. I met Maurice Grimm, who was then retired, at his home in Saint-Blaise, Switzerland. He was very charming and modest... as only really great professionals are.
Maurice Grimm belongs to a generation of Watchmakers who have made history in the second part of the 20th century, before computers and CAD/CAM tools took over... He used sliding rulers, hand drawing, hand tooling...the way things had been done for many years.
Still, with an extraordinary technical imagination, and a fantastic talent, he produced ground-breaking watches.
M. Grimm worked for many years for Omega, and one of his most acclaimed watches, a museum piece today, is the ultra ultra thin quartz watch ("Dinosaure", caliber 1335, 1,42 mm and later 1,35 mm thick) that Omega introduced in 1980. When introduced it was the thinnest watch in the world - and kept its record for many years. The construction concept of this watch (integration of the movement in the case) was later used to design... the Swatch... after SMH Group (Swatch Group) acquired Omega in 1985.
But Maurice Grimm did more than that - he developed 3 tourbillon watches (almost) single-handedly:
- The ultra-thin automatic tourbillion for Audemars Piguet (caliber 2870) in 1986
- The Audemars automatic tourbillon with the crown on the back of the case, date and power display (caliber 2875) in 1991
- The first central tourbillion, for Omega (caliber 1170) in 1994
I have seen the prototypes of these tourbillon watches when I met Mr. Grimm... and they were breathtaking!
How did he get to design tourbillons? As Mr. Grimm had quite some freedom within Omega due to the respect he had earned as a watchmaker over the years, he was allowed to develop the first design (caliber 2870) more or less as he wished, and Audemars Piguet bought the ready watch concept since Omega, by 1985 a part of the Swatch Group, did not find a fitting place for it in its product range. Audemars kept the watch almost as it was, even the dial design. The only thing they changed was the place of the little opening which shows the hammer winder of the automatic movement.
Audemars liked Mr. Grimm so much, that they "borrowed" him on a contract from Omega/Swatch Group later, to design a second tourbillon for Audemars (caliber 2875, launched 1991).
By 1990, having worked with tourbillons for many years he had imagined a way to create a central tourbillon - and Swatch Group, with Omega's 100th anniversary approaching, decided to take this opportunity to show off the brand's capabilities. The central tourbillon was launched in 1994, and has been acclaimed as a major piece of watchmaking history - and many articles have been dedicated to it, not least on www.watchprosite.com . click here
Omega Central Tourbillon (caliber 1170) by M. Grimm (1994)
A piece of trivia is that the Omega central tourbillon is COSC quality, while the tourbillons by Breguet (another Swatch Group brand) could not be COSC certified... Apparently Breguet people did not like that so much...but Mr. Grimm found that quite amusing
As far as I know, at that time the result was that although the movement of the Omega could get the COSC seal, Swatch preferred not to put it on the watch, in order not to embarrass its top brand - Breguet.It's clear that Mr. Grimm is a fantastic watchmaker (3 tourbillons, of which 2 are ground-breaking!) who has had great influence on watchmaking (the Swatch was built on his ideas)...
I was very honored to meet him - and think he deserves recognition for the great watches he has brought into the world!
This message has been edited by mkt33 on 2008-03-23 18:24:49
Tribute to a great Watchmaker: Maurice Grimm
