The future founder of one of the youngest and most ambitious watch brands in Switzerland, Roger Dubuis, dreamed of dedicating his life to watchmaking since childhood, ever since he was a boy and began to diligently visit a watchmaker’s workshop in his native town of Viveilleux on the shores of Lake Geneva, where he could spend hours watching the master at work.
After graduating with honors from the Geneva School of Watchmakers, Dubuis spent 20 years gaining experience at various Swiss manufactures before opening his own watch repair and restoration workshop in Geneva in 1980. The master’s interests also included the development and improvement of mechanisms commissioned by major watch companies in Geneva.
The starting point in the history of the new watch company was Dubuis’ meeting with the brilliant watch designer Carlos Diaz, who had once been involved in developing designs for Frank Muller models.
In order to stand out from watch companies with a century-long history, the newly-minted tandem relies on elite watch models that combine technical innovations, impeccable precision and visionary design, which will later be embodied in the brand’s first collections. But more on that later. In the meantime, an experienced watchmaker and designer with a wide circle of collector friends open an independent company called SOGEM (Société Genevoise des Montres).
The name Roger Dubuis, more familiar to watchmaking fans, will appear only 4 years later, when the company, according to Carlos Diaz, “earns the right to be called a manufacture”. The newly-minted manufacture develops at a dizzying speed, and if at the very beginning of its existence the company’s staff numbered only 2 people, then by 2001 Roger Dubuis acquired its own building in Meyrin, where it transferred all production. By 2003, the company was already almost completely self-sufficient in watchmaking parts, and 2 years later it moved to a new building, combining all watch workshops and service centers on an area of 14,500 m2. By this time, the young company already had 500 people on staff.
The first models under the Roger Dubuis brand appeared on the watch market in 1996 and were represented by two collections of complicated watches. The Sympathie collection combined square-shaped models with an originally curved case on four sides. The Hommage series included classic round watches, distinguished by a restrained, strict style. The later released TooMuch, MuchMore, GoldenSquare and FollowMe series amazed the public with their deliberate extravagance and originality of design. What are the FollowMe ladies’ watches worth alone, the dial of which is made in the form of a cross, borrowed from the Swiss flag.
In the early 2000s, the use of silicon is gaining more and more popularity. Being a lighter material than gold and platinum, silicon is more resistant to corrosion and four times stronger than the notorious titanium. Picking up on the newfangled trend, Roger Dubuis presented the Excalibur collection in 2005, which confirmed the originality of the brand and its right to its own niche in the market of watch innovations.
Distinctive features of the new models were a 45-millimeter case, geometric grooves made along the edge of the bezel, and triple strap fastenings. From its predecessors, the watches borrowed a massive winding crown and time indication using Roman numerals.
Tradition and modernity
Since its creation, the Roger Dubuis manufacture has established its distinctiveness from other watch brands with the extroverted aesthetics of its collections and the creation of its own movements inspired by the best traditions of Swiss watchmaking. During the first decade of its existence, the manufacture will produce more than 20 exclusive calibers, covering the entire range of complications presented in modern watchmaking.
In 2006, within the framework of the International Salon of High Watchmaking Art, the company will present 6 manufacture movements, half of which will receive the status of a world premiere. All of them provided the operation of new products from the Excalibur collection and were marked with the prestigious Geneva hallmark.
Since 2012, the Roger Dubuis company has been headed by Jean-Marc Pontroué. With extensive experience in the luxury industry, this man strictly followed the main rule: a luxury watch brand must have one flagship product. The Excalibur Double Tourbillon Skeleton model became such a flagship for the company. The double skeletonized tourbillon with an unusual star-shaped bridge became the basis of all advertising images of the brand and the main element of the boutique design. The brand’s modern collection is built around it, represented by two main lines: Excalibur and Velvet.
