Girard Perregaux

Two Purists at the GP Manufacture

 

Blomman and I had earlier this week the great pleasure to visit the GP manufacture in La Chaux-de-Fonds. As this was my first visit to GP, naturally I was very excited. We were warmly welcomed by the entire team and they did take very good care of us.

 

One of our goals was to see as much as possible from the current collection and take fresh photos for our community. I think between me and Blomman we nearly shot 1500 photos, so the next few months there is plenty of material.

 

So let’s start with a little photo story:

 

The famous blue building:

  

 

And the obligatory wristshot even it is not a good photo, I need to show this one:

 

 

Day 1, we started to look at almost the entire current collection. Overall, I believe we saw 45 watches from the current collection, spending 5 hours taking photos. It was a blast and the only problem is that my wish list has suddenly grown again significantly. It’s very much a different story handling a watch in real than only seeing it on photos.

 

At the beginning we were sporty with the Chrono Hawk and Sea Hawk models.

 

 

 

While I confirmed that the Chrono Hawk is too big for small me, the Sea Hawk is actually quite good on the wrist and as a Diver not too big.

 

 

 

Then we moved on to the Traveller. The new model frankly did not convince me when it came out. The new lug design and the increased size, but this was one watch that surprised me the most as in real this is super-nice, well fitting my wrist and really really beautiful with a lot of depth on the dials.

  

 

  

 

 

The white dial GMT has now quite a top spot on my wish list.

 

On we went with the 1966 and Vintage 45 line. I’ll keep some photos in my bag for now for future more in-depth reports, but here are two that are stunning pieces, the 1966 white gold, blue dial in 41mm and the 70^th anniversary Vintage 45 in bicolour case.

 

 

We also looked at some of the very stunning Ladies watches from GP, in particular the Cat’s Eye with lots and lots of diamonds.

 

 

 

The dial on the yellow gold is a masterpiece

 

 

At that time we already started to get tired taken so many photos, so we needed to inject new excitement and I tell you I was hovering above the floor when the Tourbillons arrived.

 

The Neo Tourbillon in Pink Gold:

 

 

The classic Three-Golden-Bridge Tourbillon in white gold:

 

 

And the Vintage 45 with straight bridges in Pink Gold:

 

 

The straight bridges are even an older design than the arrow-shaped bridges and GP is paying tribute to the original design of the TGB with this model.

 

Either of those are an absolute dream watch, but now I’m dreaming of all three…

 

There were many more, like the Tri-Axial Tourbillon, a few diamond-clad watches etc. Here is a rather amazing tray setup:

 

 

The following day, we went to see the manufacture building. GP decided to restore an old manufacture building when they expanded and they preserved the beautiful Art Deco design. Here are some impressions from the manufacture, a very modern and today highly computerized process.

 

 

 

We saw a lot of Constant Escapements being assembled and tested, always a treat for the eye to see this watch ticking.

 

In the Haute Horology Labs, we could admire the manual polishing and appreciate the time and effort that goes into the decoration of a Three-Golden-Bridge Tourbillon. Here as well, we saw and listened to the new Minute Repeater.

 

 

We then moved on to the Villa Jean Richard which houses the Product Design and soon again a museum.

  

 

 

 

 

 

After lunch, we had the opportunity to admire some museum pieces, historic pocket watches and also vintage wrist watches.

 

My personal highlight, was of course the original Vintage 45.

 

 

 

 

 

We also learned about how GP watches made it into Japan, but that’s probably an entire story on its own for a future post.

 

After a final meeting with Stefano Macaluso, the head of the Product Design and also meeting his team, who quite enjoyed looking at some of my and Blomman’s vintage watches we brought along, it was time again to drive back to Geneva airport and fly home.

 

Two days of an out-of-this-world experience were coming to an end, but the memories will live on forever. So ending my report, I can only again thank the entire team at GP for their hospitality for giving us the opportunity to meet and see all these beautiful watches.

 

As soon to be bankrupt CC.