My Visit to Villeret...Home of Minerva...

Delayed...but not forgotten...

I'm finally getting around to writing up my second visit to Minerva's Atelier in Villeret during Watches & Wonders a couple of weeks ago.

First, a little history...liberally lifted from the timeandwatches.com article "History of Minerva, from foundation to integration into Montblanc and present day" together with images taken from my visit and my collection.

Villeret’s watchmaking tradition began in 1858 when brothers Charles and Hyppolite Robert founded the company "H. & C. Robert", later becoming just "C. Robert", then changing again to "Robert Frères Villeret" in 1878 when his sons Charles and Georges, and later also Yvan Robert (1840-1912), took over the leadership of the company.

The company began registering brands in 1886, starting with "Mercure", adding "Minerva" (the goddess of farming, craftsmanship and science) in 1887, and "Ariana", "Tropic", and others in 1898. Each with its own logo and products, these brands were associated to the "RFV"  logo characterized by an arrow, a symbol which became a signature of the brand.

From 1895 "Robert Frères Villeret" began with the production of its own watch movements.

The first was the 18-ligne No. 1 movement with cylinder escapement which remained in production until 1941, as well as the No. 2 caliber 18- or 19-ligne movement with a Swiss lever escapement. 

Minerva referred to their calibres by size, in ligne, and sequence number. Therefore all calibres sized around 18 ligne would be called "Calibre 18” followed by a number. So its first calibre was known as Calibre 18-1.

The third, introduced in 1903, was Calibre 19-3 and became known for its superior finish. 

In 1902, the company moved in the buildings that are still in use today. This uninterrupted production of manual mechanical movements in the same location for more than a century and through the 1970s quartz crisis is a rarity in the Swiss watchmaking industry.

In 1908, Robert Freres began with the production of chronographs and stopwatches and introduced their first chronograph movement, the Calibre 19-9.  Like most Minerva chronographs, it did not feature a chronograph hour-counter but only the minute-counter.

With the trade-mark Minerva, positioned at the top of the company's range, the company gained worldwide recognition for its precise chronometry and became a leading specialist in the fabrication of professional watches. Capable of measuring time accurately to 1/100th of a second in 1916, its mechanical stopwatches were fundamental to the evolution of modern-day motor racing.

Introduced in 1923 in Minerva-branded chronographs, the first 12 3/4- line chronograph calibre from Minerva was number 20, so it became known as Calibre 13-20. 

A column-wheel chronograph with a Breguet balance spring and 17 jewels, Calibre 13-20 was designed as a mono pusher but was available after 1940 in bi-pusher configurations with 30- or 45-minute counters. It was one of the few chronograph calibres on the market on its introduction and was developed in collaboration with Dubois-Depraz. It was remarkably well-developed for the era and continued in production for decades.

Watch enthusiasts are able to recognize Minerva's Calibre 13 by the unusual positions of the pushers: Rather than being located between the crown and lugs at 30°, they are moved toward the lugs at 37° from the crown. 

Considering the exceptional success of Minerva-branded products, in 1929 the whole company was renamed to "Minerva SA, Villeret". 

In 1934, the watch engineer Jacques Pelot, working for the company since 1921, and the mechanical technician Charles Haussener became the new owners of the business. 

Their leadership brought to new successes as demonstrated by their appointment as the official time-keepers of the Olympic ski events at Garmisch-Partenkirchen in 1936 and the introduction of several new movements.

In 1943 Andre Frey, the nephew of Jacques Pelot, designed a remarkable movement, the Calibre 10-48 that was used for a watch model, called Pythagore. In designing this movement Frey positioned the bridges using mathematical proportions defined by the Golden Ratio (1.618...), the discovery of which is attributed to Pythagoras, hence the name of the watch equipped with this Calibre.

The new Club 58 watch for 2024 takes the 1948 Pythagore manual movement and turns it into an automatic movement with the rotor hidden beneath the dial...

So from the caseback...it looks like a manual movement...

...but under the dial with a turn of the bezel...you can see the engraved rotor...

During the quartz crisis of the 1970s, when the number of Swiss watch manufacturers dropped from 1618 in 1970 to 632 in 1984, Minerva had the force to survive thanks to the recognized quality of its mechanical chronographs.

The rare capability to in-house produce its own balance wheel and hairspring combined with the mastery of various timekeeping frequencies, enabled Minerva to maintain its reputation in chronometric precision among professionals and watch connoisseurs.

In 2007, Minerva which had been acquired by Richemont was handed over to Montblanc to expand and enhance their watchmaking capability.

And that brings us to today and a visit to the manufacture.

During the tour, we visited each part of the process.

We spent some time with the experts in finishing...learning about anglage and perlage...

Here ChronoGuy attempts perlage on the vintage machines still in use at Minerva...

Most of the machines are the same ones that produced components for the chronographs at the start of the 20th Century...

Minerva is one of the few manufactures that produces its own hairsprings...the "Spiral"...they have two women who are the experts and produce all of the hairsprings used in Minerva watches...

We also had the chance to spend some time with the watchmakers and discuss the fine art of watchmaking...

As part of the tour, we also had the chance to spend time in the archive. Here are some photos of vintage NOS parts that reside in the archive and in the visitor's reception room at the Atelier...

...all had a wonderful time at the Atelier and then the long drive back to Geneva and a wonderful dinner with the Montblanc executives to finish off the evening.

There you go...hope you enjoyed the journey!