COVER STORY
the production of “turned parts”
such as screws, pinions, wheels
and crowns. This specialty, known
as décolletage in French, involves
feeding long metal bars—sometimes brass, other times steel,
titanium, or copper-berylium alloy—into long lathes to shape and
refine the features of individual
micro-components.
Perfecting these small components involves multiple steps.
The teeth on gears must be polished and finished before they can
be sent to a watchmaker. All of the microcomponents made from
stainless steel are subjected to extreme temperatures in an on-site
oven as part of a critical tempering process. This hardens the components, increasing robustness.
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But the critical distinction between Meyrin and most of Franck
Muller’s other facilities is that machines and their technicians play
the central role. Knowledge of cad cam design and CNC operation
is likely to land someone a job at Meyrin. Assembly, finishing and
other skilled handiwork are performed at the next two sites I visited.
CRAFTING MOVEMENTS AT WATCHLAND
When most people think of where Franck Muller timepieces
are made, they think of Franck Muller Watchland, a bucolic
campus in the tony Geneva suburb of Genthod. Anchored by a
beautiful, art nouveau chateau on a sprawling piece of real estate
reaching all the way to the shores of Lake Geneva, Watchland is
an almost Disney-like representation of Swissness. In addition to
hosting the assembly of movements and the fabrication of a number
of the components, Watchland is the administrative hub of Franck
Muller. Management, product design, R&D, marketing—all of the