Vacheron Constantin ThinkSwiss Partnership

February 18, 2012 (New York City, NY) – Vacheron Constantin, the world's oldest continuous watch manufacturer for more than 255 years, has partnered with the Consulate General of Switzerland in New York to host THINKSWISS:  GENÈVE MEETS NEW YORK.  The week-long festival taking place March 6-12, 2012, will highlight the contemporary relevance of ideas born in Geneva and their impact on current American issues.

Vacheron Constantin Supports

THINKSWISS:  GENÈVE MEETS NEW YORK

A Festival of Global Ideas Born in Geneva

New York City , March 6-12, 2012

In celebration of the 300^th anniversary of the birth of the Geneva-born philosopher, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, who himself came from a long line of watchmakers, the THINKSWISS: GENÈVE MEETS NEW YORK program includes more than 10 events addressing topics that lie at the core of Swiss and American identity, such as participatory democracy, humanitarian principles and freedom of information, animated in conversations that bring together personalities from the US and Switzerland. 

Vacheron Constantin is proud to support such an important cultural initiative.  The partnership pays tribute to the company's historic roots in Geneva dating back to the mid-eighteenth century, when Jean-Marc Vacheron opened his workshop in the St-Gervais district of Geneva, the same neighborhood in which Rousseau was raised.  By this time, Geneva had become a center of the Enlightenment and a hub for debate of liberal ideas.  The cabinotiers, the city's watchmaking craftsmen elite, were also liberal-minded intellectuals and devoted participants of political debate. In his Discourse on the Inequality of Men, published the same year Jean-Marc Vacheron opened his atelier, Rousseau idealized his watchmaking lineage, epitomized by his watchmaker father, as the embodiment of an aspirational life: "… living from the work of his hands and feeding his soul with the most sublime of truths."  Contemporaries separated by a mere generation, linked through common roots and through the pursuit of Enlightentened truths, the lives of Jean-Marc Vacheron and Rousseau thus intersected. 

"Vacheron Constantin is proud to support this festival celebrating these ideas born in Geneva at the same time as our company's founding, which continue to have such relevance both in New York and around the world" says Hugues de Pins, President of Vacheron Constantin North America.

On March 6, 2012, Vacheron Constantin VIP clients and friends of the brand will be invited to an intimate inaugural cocktail at a private setting in New York City, hosted by Hugues de Pins and Ambassador François Barras, Consul General of Switzerland in New York. 

To find out more information about the schedule of events, please visit www.thinkswissny.org.

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About Vacheron Constantin:

Established in Geneva in 1755, Vacheron Constantin is the world's oldest continuous watch manufacturer and a jewel in Geneva's crown of couture watchmakers, maintaining a seamless tradition of watch-making excellence for 255 years.  Held in high regard by watch connoisseurs and enthusiasts alike, Vacheron Constantin's strengths lie in its superlative technical mastery, aesthetic know-how and extremely high level of finish.  In 2011, Vacheron Constantin opened its first US boutique located at 729 Madison Avenue at the corner of 64^th Street.

About ThinkSwiss:

ThinkSwiss is an official program of the Swiss Confederation-promoting exchanges and sharing knowledge between the U.S. and Switzerland.

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