WatchTech

First of all, it's a great article.  Very well written, very informative, and very extensive.  Fantastic article!  Great find!  But at the same time, I don't think it's fair to say a watch with the Geneva Seal is necessarily a well finished watch.  I guess it depends on your standards.  I'm a person with very high standards for movement finishing.  I love a polished beveled edge to be perfect on my movement plates (the anglage in French). 

Let's put it this way.  Nowadays all the Geneva Seal decoration standards done on the gears, screws, bridges is done very quickly.  Some of it can even be done by machine, but most of it is still involving a human being.  The restriction against the using coil springs in a movement is not especially difficult; it's just all the alternative springs are integrated into the movement at the design phase when conceptualizing the movement.  This is nothing more than a design and space consideration.  Many movement engineers, especially in the upper brands already don't even think of using tradition springs, so it's not a major difficulty. 

Is a Geneva Seal watch that good of a thing?  You should really go to a factory, see the extra steps they do to get it, and make your own decision.  Then go to a factory that doesn't have it and see if you noticed that big of a difference.  Furthermore, a lot of watches that don't have a Geneva Seal are actually finished to a much higher standard than those that do.  For instance, look at mid range Roger Dubuis watches and compare them with something mid-range from Vacheron Constantin or Patek Philippe.  Generally the Roger Dubuis watch will usually exhibit a lower standard of finishing. 

A few months ago, a PuristSPro member showed us some macro photos of his Patek Philippe perpetual calendar.  We all noticed a lot of "chatter marks" in the anglage of the plates.  Is Patek Philippe really that good?  Well, it isn't.  It's just got a lot of fan boys who think there can't be anything better.  Look at a Rolls Royce, you'd think there isn't anything better, but open up the glove compartment in a Ghost or Wraith and it's got that cheap spray on flocking that a VW Polo has.  Did I mention that I'm a huge fan of Patek Philippe watches (and Rolls Royce cars too) but they're not perfect.  They're very good practical brands.  And Patek Philippe is definitely one of the brands with better movement finishing among other brands with a Geneva Seal! 

www.watchprosite.com

Some Chopard L.U.C. pieces are not Geneva Sealed, yet the finishing is quite good too. 

Look at Lange's finishing.  They can't be Geneva Sealed since they're not in Geneva.  But the movement finishing is excellent, the polish of the anglage is much better than just about any mainstream brand with a Geneva Seal.  

So it really it's a matter of perspective.  For someone who collects Philippe Dufour or Kari Voutilainen watches (the finishing on these is among the best in the world), they may actually find many Geneva Sealed timepieces to be woefully inadequate.  Those Dufour/Voutilainen buyers may find Rolex and not super-expensive special Jaeger-LeCoultre timepieces to be very industrial watches. 

But if you're a Jaeger-LeCoultre collector, and you see the movement finishing of a Patek Philippe, the first thing you'll notice is all that polished anglage, and many of the ruby jewels have an extra sense of depth to them (Geneva Seal requires use of jewels with an olive profile, whereas Jaeger-LeCoultre uses jewels that are flatter in shape).  You'll think that the Geneva Seal is the best thing in the world.  

Hope this helps!

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