Montre à Tact
WHERE TIME IS SECONDARY
Every Montre à Tact is a bespoke artistic canvas, made according to the client's wishes and tastes
In the Montre à Tact, time – shown in a wandering hours display located discreetly between the lugs – is secondary to artistic expression. Without hands or numerals, the face of the watch becomes a canvas for spectacular decorative artistry. Every watch is made to order, as a unique creation.
The touch of genius
The original montre à tact complication was developed around 1799 by Abraham-Louis Breguet, for aristocratic clients who found it impolite to consult a pocket watch in company. The name carried a double meaning: tact in the social sense, and tactility, since the watch was read entirely by touch, via a large hand and raised markers set on the outside of the case.
Svend Andersen reimagined the idea for the wrist, replacing Breguet's exterior hand with a numerical wandering hours display between the lugs. Time can be read with the briefest glance, without moving hand or wrist. Often, versions carry a second display on the dial itself.
Crafting the unique
What remains is space, with virtually limitless possibilities. Miniature painting, guiloché, marquetry, engraving, enamelling, BlueGold and many other métiers have all been deployed.
Andersen Genève calls upon a network of Switzerland's most gifted artisans to transform each watch into a work of art, according to the client's wishes and tastes.
[For more information on the Montre à Tact Kopera pictured here, with a micro-painted reproduction of an artwork by the Polish artist Tomasz Alen Kopera, see our journal post here.]
A case-making masterpiece
The unique case of the Montre à Tact is a tactile artwork in itself. Every part is made by hand in our La Chaux-de-Fonds atelier, without CNC machines.
Its 'Empire' form – a fluted band sandwiched between front and back sections – is inspired by Breguet's pocket watches, and specifically his own Montre à Tact models, where the haptic quality of that band, with its raised hour markers, was paramount.
The fluted flanks taper inwards at 80 degrees, and are broken at 6 o'clock by an 8 x 19mm window set between the scrolled lugs. Each lug is made separately and soldered to the case with minute precision.
At 42mm across and 9.8mm thick, the case keeps an unusually clean profile, since there is no crown: the display drum encircling the movement leaves no room for one. Instead, the setting mechanism is recessed into the gentle camber of the case-back, in a system patented by Andersen Genève.
What began as a mechanical necessity became an extension of the idea: the watch cannot be adjusted until it is taken off, in private.
Montre à Tact Bluegold Guilloché
The Montre à Tact was the first watch in which Andersen Genève used BlueGold – the precise heat-tempering of 24k gold, combined with iron elements, to achieve a rich, iridescent shade of blue.
This proprietary technique has since become a signature of Andersen Genève watchmaking. Carried out in our Geneva workshop, we are able to achieve a wide range of colours which, when combined with decorative guilloché or tapisserie engraving, give an enthralling luminosity.
BlueGold dials in a wide spectrum of colours, from deep purples and pinks to rich caramel tones, have become a favourite choice among clients commissioning Montre à Tact watches.
Montre à Tact Narcissus
For this Montre à Tact, Andersen Genève was commissioned to recreate a 1728 artwork by the French painter Francois Lemoyne, showing the classical story of Narcissus captivated by his reflection in a pool of water. Working under magnification, the artist applies layer after layer of translucent acrylic paint using ultra-fine sable brushes.
Montre à Tact Mokume-Gane
The ancient Japanese metal-working technique of Mokume-Gane, sees different coloured metals fused together to create a stunningly rich wood-grain effect. In this Montre à Tact, it was paired with a bi-colour case in white gold with rose gold lugs.
Montre à Tact Arc de Triomphe
With a white gold case, this Montre à Tact features a BlueGold dial with both hand-engraving and guilloché work, showing an intricate image of the Arc de Triomphe in Paris, France.
Montre à Tact Poker
In 2008, Andersen Genève began a series of Montre à Tact watches recreating in miniature the satirical paintings of Cassius Marcellus Coolidge. A popular painter of the American Gilded Age, Coolidge was famous for his anthropomorphic ‘Dogs Playing Poker’ series. The watch, with a bi-colour case in white and rose gold, even contains a witty play on the idea of poker ‘hands’ for timekeeping: the dial opening shows the hours as poker hands. 12 o’clock is, of course, a royal flush.
Montre à Tact for OnlyWatch 2019
Created for the 2019 edition of Only Watch, the biennial charity auction of unique pieces, this Montre à Tact turns its dial into a portrait of Geneva at dusk. The scene, with Lac Léman and the Jet d'Eau, the Salève and Mont Blanc beyond, the spires of the Cathédrale Saint-Pierre and a paddle steamer crossing the water, was engraved freehand, without template, by Kees Engelbarts, a long-standing collaborator of Svend Andersen. Sky and water are two discs of mother-of-pearl, each 0.40mm thick, selected by Svend himself; the Jet d'Eau is carved from fossilised mammoth ivory, worked until almost translucent. The metals record the hour: 18k red gold for Mont Blanc catching the last of the sun, 21k BlueGold for the Salève and the old town already fallen into shadow, 18k white gold for the steamer.
The Art of the Possible
To discuss ideas for your own Andersen Genève Montre à Tact, please get in touch. A thrilling journey of creativity and collaboration awaits.
