IWC Watches: Old Wine in a New Bottle

In the words of IWC's current CEO, Michael Sarp, IWC Watches speak of the “highest quality with unique technical and design characteristics and thus continue to experience the pleasures of innovation."

One interesting fact about IWC (International Watch Company) is that it is possibly the only renowned Swiss watch company that was founded by an American. In 1868 Florentine Ariosto Jones -an engineer from Boston, Massachusetts - founded this precision watch company. Another point of exception is related to its location. While most of the Swiss watch-manufacturing units were located in western Switzerland, the workshop of IWC was located in Schaffhausen, in eastern part of Switzerland.

During the 1860’s, production costs of the watches were quite high in America mainly because of two reasons. First, most of the parts of watches were hand made and secondly the supply of skilled artisans was costly and insufficient. In this situation, Florentine planned to take the advantages of comparatively lower wages of European laborers and the excellence of Swiss watch making know-how. He planned to manufacture watches in Switzerland and import them into the United States. Thus he coined the name for his company as International Watch Company.

But things did not work perfectly for him and within a few years time he was forced to relinquish control of his company. Through one or two changes of hands, the IWC came under the ownership of Johannes Raschenbach-Vogel. Under his leadership, started the production of first pocket watches with digital time indication. Also launched was the famous Calibre 52 movement, which was quite a revolutionary concept at that time.

The post 2nd World War era saw this company’s upward growth. It became famous with its specialty watches, such as the Mark XI and Ingenieur which protected the movement against magnetic fields .

The IWC watches of 1940's and 50's era fall in the vintage watch category and became a collector’s delight today.

Other achievements of IWC include the launching of "DaVinci" series - a perpetual calendar chronograph wristwatch, mechanically programmed for the next 500 years.

Another feather was added to its hat in the year 2000, with the introduction of the 5000 caliber, a new mechanical movement with a power reserve of seven days and an automatic movement. Today with the revenue of millions of Swiss francs and with the strength of over 350 employees, IWC is a revered name in the global watch industry.

For more information about IWC watches or related products, choose from one of the following links:

Watches | Men's Watches | Women's Watches