Les Brenassons · Jura
HeureBleue38
One watch, wound by hand, with nothing to hide. The calibre beside these words is running — it is keeping your time, six beats to the second.
Mise à l’heure — glissez la couronne
La Montre
| Diamètre | 38 mm |
|---|---|
| Épaisseur | 9.8 mmsapphire to sapphire |
| Mouvement | Calibre V.03, hand-wound21 jewels, adjusted in 5 positions |
| Fréquence | 21,600 vibrations an hour3 Hz — six beats each second |
| Réserve de marche | 60 hoursshown as a waxing moon at nine |
| Boîtier | Steel or rose gold |
| Cadran | Ivory lacquer, applied gold indicesleaf hands in flame-blued steel |
| Production | 12 pieces a year |
Drawn from six o’clock. The crown is the only thing that sticks out, and it is knurled deep enough to wind with a thumb in winter.
L’Atelier
We make one watch at a time because we own one bench.
- 1
- établi en poirier — pearwood bench, two drawers that stick
- 2
- tabourets — stools, one higher than the other
- 1
- tour d’horloger — watchmaker’s lathe, bought in 1987, older than that
- 31
- limes — files, of which Colette uses four
- 1
- fenêtre au nord-est — window, the important tool
The workshop is the front room of a farmhouse above Les Brenassons, facing north-east so the light stays flat until noon. Colette Vesper-Aubry spent nineteen years finishing other people’s movements in the valley before she drew her own. Her nephew Basile joined in the third winter; he cuts the wheels and pinions, she does everything that gets looked at through a loupe.
A Heure Bleue takes about four weeks. Three of them are finishing. When a watch leaves, the bench is cleared, the next plate is clamped down, and that is the whole of our production planning.
We do not have a boutique. If you are passing, ring the bell twice — once sounds like the postman, and we let the postman wait.
Finissage
Every bridge edge is filed to forty-five degrees and polished with gentian wood. Move across it: the bevel lights all at once, or not at all.
A screw head lapped on a tin plate until it is flat to the wavelength. Black from every angle but one; find the one.
The mainplate, under the dial where nobody looks: overlapping circles laid down one at a time with a rubber peg and a steady wrist.
Liste d’attente
There is no deposit and no configurator. Leave an address; when your turn is two watches away, Colette writes to you herself and asks which metal you would like.