Abraham-Louis Breguet, born in Neuchâtel, then a Prussian principality, was a horologist who made many innovations in the course of a career in watchmaking industry. He was the founder of the Breguet company, which is now the luxury watch division of the Swiss Swatch Group.
The Worshipful Company of Clockmakers was established under a royal charter granted by King Charles I in 1631. It ranks sixty-first among the livery companies of the City of London, and comes under the jurisdiction of the Privy Council. The company established a library and its museum in 1813, which is the oldest specific collection of clocks and watches worldwide. This is administered by the company's affiliated charity, the Clockmakers' Charity, and is presently housed on the second floor of London's Science Museum. The modern aims of the company and its museum are charitable and educational, in particular to promote and preserve clockmaking and watchmaking, which as of 2019 were added to the HCA Red List of Endangered Crafts.
A watchmaker is an artisan who makes and repairs watches. Since a majority of watches are now factory-made, most modern watchmakers only repair watches. However, originally they were master craftsmen who built watches, including all their parts, by hand. Modern watchmakers, when required to repair older watches, for which replacement parts may not be available, must have fabrication skills, and can typically manufacture replacements for many of the parts found in a watch. The term clockmaker refers to an equivalent occupation specializing in clocks.
Édouard Bovet was a Swiss watchmaker and founder of the Bovet Fleurier watch company.
In horology, a tourbillon is an addition to the mechanics of a watch escapement to increase accuracy. Conceived by the British watchmaker and inventor John Arnold, it was developed by his friend the Swiss-French watchmaker Abraham-Louis Breguet and patented by Breguet on 26 June 1801. In a tourbillon the escapement and balance wheel are mounted in a rotating cage, with the goal of eliminating errors of poise in the balance giving a uniform weight.
John Arnold was an English watchmaker and inventor.
The watchmaker analogy or watchmaker argument is a teleological argument used to argue for the pseudoscientific concept of intelligent design. The analogy states that a design implies a designer, by an intelligent designer, i.e. a creator deity. The watchmaker analogy was given by William Paley in his 1802 book Natural Theology or Evidences of the Existence and Attributes of the Deity. The original analogy played a prominent role in natural theology and the "argument from design," where it was used to support arguments for the existence of God of the universe, in both Christianity and Deism. Prior to Paley, however, Sir Isaac Newton, René Descartes, and others from the time of the scientific revolution had each believed "that the physical laws he [each] had uncovered revealed the mechanical perfection of the workings of the universe to be akin to a watch, wherein the watchmaker is God."
Thomas Tompion, FRS (1639–1713) was an English clockmaker, watchmaker and mechanician who is still regarded to this day as the "Father of English Clockmaking". Tompion's work includes some of the most historic and important clocks and watches in the world, and can command very high prices whenever outstanding examples appear at auction. A plaque commemorates the house he shared on Fleet Street in London with his equally famous pupil and successor George Graham.
George Daniels, CBE, FBHI, FSA, AHCI was an English horologist who was considered by some to be one of the best in the world in the field of luxury mechanical watches and timepieces during his lifetime. He was a watchmaker who built complete watches by hand. But it was his creation of the coaxial escapement for which he is most remembered. The movement, which theoretically removed the need to add a lubricant, has been used by Omega in most of their collections since 1999 with the exception of the Speedmaster Moonwatch.
Jean-François Hobler was a Swiss-born, naturalised-English, watchmaker.
A counterfeit watch is an unauthorised copy of an authentic watch. High-end luxury watches such as Rolex, Patek Philippe and Richard Mille are frequently counterfeited and sold on city streets and online. With technological advancements, many non-luxury and inexpensive quartz watches are also commonly counterfeited.
Thomas Mudge was an English horologist who invented the lever escapement, a technological improvement to the pocket watch.
Backes & Strauss is an English company that designs and produces high-end timepieces and jewellery. Founded in 1789 in Hanau, Germany, it is the oldest diamond company in the world.
Daniel Quare was an English clockmaker and instrument maker who invented a repeating watch movement in 1680 and a portable barometer in 1695.
Edward East (1602–1696) was watchmaker and clockmaker to King Charles I of England. He was a notable horologist who succeeded David Ramsay. East was trained as a goldsmith, and he was a founding member of the London Clockmakers Company in 1631.
The Shadwell forgeries, also known as the Shadwell Dock forgeries, the Shadwell Shams, or the Billy and Charley forgeries, were a series of mid-19th-century forgeries of medieval lead and lead-alloy artefacts. The latter name derives from the two Londoners, William "Billy" Smith and Charles "Charley" Eaton, who were responsible for their large-scale manufacture between 1857 and 1870. At the time, some antiquarians were fooled by the forgeries, despite them being crudely made by two individuals with limited skill in metalworking and little knowledge of medieval art.
Charles Oudin is one of the oldest French horology firms. It was founded in Paris at the end of the 18th century by Jean-Charles Oudin, who came from a family of clockmakers in Northwest France. There were four generations of Oudins who were clockmakers, as of the mid 18th century, first in the Meuse region and later, in Paris. Several members of the Oudin family worked for the master watch and clockmaker Abraham-Louis Breguet.
John Tolson (1691–1737) was an important if elusive English clockmaker and watchmaker of the early eighteenth century who, while not particularly remarkable for his invention, is noteworthy because of the fine quality of his clocks and watches. The style of his early longcase clocks owes much to Thomas Tompion, and the delicate functionality of his early longcase wheelwork echoes Tompion's standards. His short career of 22 years before an early death in 1737 makes his clocks and watches relatively rare and they can command high prices whenever outstanding examples appear at auction.
Rebecca Struthers is an English watchmaker, historian, author, engineer, and gemmologist. She works with her husband, Craig, who is a master watchmaker. Their watchmaking studio is in Leek, Staffordshire, after moving from the Jewellery Quarter in Birmingham. The Telegraph describes Struthers and her husband with "very few people in the world [have] this level of skill". She won the Heritage Crafts award in 2021, presented by King Charles III. She is the only practising watchmaker in the United Kingdom with a PhD in horology.
