CZAPEK & CIE
BY MARTON RADKAI
RE-BIRTH OF A Royal
TIMEKEEPER
The inside story of the new Czapek & Cie.
Over a year or so ago, on an excruciatingly hot July day and in the midst of a huge project with an insane deadline, I got a call from a friendly gentleman who asked me if I could have a look at a text about a new watch that was about to hit the market. It was all very hush-hush, he couldn’ t say too much about it right now and I was to keep this absolutely confidential. I was only moderately curious, since misappropriation of journalists as marketing tools tends to be widespread in all industries these days, and my time was limited. The whole confidential business sounded suspiciously like those strange embargoes that are meant to generate buzz.
What he did mention was that the new watch was to be a revival of the works of a 19th-century Polish watchmaker working in Geneva, a somewhat mysterious fellow, who fled Poland after fighting against the Russians in the November Uprising of 1830-31. It caught my ear:“ Sure,” I thought,“ Patek’ s illegitimate son …” Funny thing: As it turns out, that cynical thought, born of my ignorance of historic detail, was not too far from the truth. The caller
was Xavier de Roquemaurel, and the watchmaker he was referring to was one Franczisek( François) Czapek, who, for six years, from 1839 to 1845, had been a partner of Antoine Norbert de Patek. When their contract expired, Patek signed up with another expert watchmaker, a Parisian named Adrien Philippe, who had invented a system to wind pocket watches without using a key. Czapek, apparently, did not like the idea, and was happy to continue on his own. The brochure showed up a few days later as promised and revealed some surprisingly nice material. The single Czapek watch presented bore the number 3430 and had been made around 1850. The esthetics of the watch appeared rooted less in western European rationalism of the industrial age and more in eastern European romanticism. It had a broad face with lots of brilliant white space. Two subdials cut into the grand-feu enamel at 7:30 and 4:30 displayed seconds and a seven-day power reserve respectively. The power reserve had a clever double hand that also pointed to a seven-day calendar.
“ The watches used to be wound up on Sundays and then would
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WRISTWATCH | 2017