Extraordinary artistry: Jaquet Droz paillone enamel dial watch
I just returned from a two day visit at Jaquet Droz. A watchmanufacturer who first caught my attention some years ago during Baselworld when I walked by their stand and saw a watchmaker (or better miniature painter/artist) paint tiny pieces of art on a watchdial. Back then, I was probably simply to new to all this to understand what talent is needed to do this.
During my visit, Jaquet Droz gave me the opportunity to paint a small lion face on a watchdial. I had 20 minutes time. We were a small group of visitors, and after 20 minutes, we realized oh my god, this is way more difficult than anyone expected. My "lion head" looked more like a mountain range, others had painted a hedgehog and some other strange animals (well, at least you could tell that it must be an animal!??).
The art of paillone goes back nearly 3 centuries. Pierre Jaquet-Droz created the first paillone pocketwatches around 1740 to 1750.
Pierre Jaquet-Droz founded his company at the young age of 17 in 1738. He delivered his pocketwatches as well as his automatons around Europe to aristocratic families and to royalty. And that is where some of his pieces may still be found nowadays. But that is a while other story which I will write about some other time.
Back to the art of paillone.
This is the oven where the paillone dial is made. The oven generated a heat of about 800 degrees Celsius.
The leaf gold above is pressed on the enamel dial that is made in the first step in the oven. After the leaf gold is added, it goes back to the oven. Then a transparent layer of enamel is added to protect the leaf gold applications. The result is a dial like this:
The final watch is a beauty to behold. While I know that beauty is perceived differently all over the world, having seen the artistic skills behind this kind of dial clearly showed me that this is not something easy to make. The skills for it are not taught in any watchmaking school. And when Swatch Group took over Jaquet Droz, they took quite some time until they understood each step of the process to make a paillone dial.
This is a wristshot to show you how the watch feels on the wrist. This is a 39mm watch while there are also a 43mm timepieces available.
Paillone enameling is a true art requiring exceptional talent and sense for beauty and style. It is something you will not find elsewhere.
I hope you enjoyed this voyage into a different kind of watchmaking.