The Association “Henri Grandjean, Valeurs & Héritage” has achieved a premiere: by assigning the after-sales service of a bygone brand to one of the 21st century’s most talented watchmaker-restorers, The organization enshrines a major 18th-century watchmaker’s legacy.

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Today’s watchmaking industry is fueled by its prestigious past and leverages its history to strengthen its legitimacy and enhance its creativity.

Unprecedented spotlight

The 2024 rebirth of a legendary name in watchmaking and Swiss history is brought to life by the remarkable expertise of Nicolas Commergnat, founder of Alliance Genève Ltd and master watchmaker for one of the most renowned auction houses in the world. Apart from the hundreds of lots that flow through his workbenches every year, including the world’s most media-savvy and record-breaking timepieces, this watchmaker of the new generation is also skilled, out of passion, at recreating the manufacturing drawings of unique old mechanisms. Thanks to his Keyence reverse engineering technology means he can accurately measure up to the thickness of a SuperLuminova coating on an index or a hand.

Then, in the name of a tireless passion for these rare treasures that come up at auction as bequests and inheritances, he sometimes uses his material spectrometer to reliably determine their origin, period and historical authenticity.

Authentication and origin certificates

The ultra-valuable information resulting from the analysis techniques perfected by master watchmaker Nicolas Commergnat, and sometimes engraved in the blockchain’s Marble, is of the utmost interest to both insurance companies and counterfeit hunters.

«Today, we are privileged to be offering the most credible avenues of authenticity for all Henri Grandjean pieces still on the auction market, whether in terms of materials, dates of manufacture or the techniques of the eras in which they were made. Also, to match this unique expertise with the wealth of historical data gathered by the science and technology historian Rossella Baldi, an expert on 18th-century watchmaking who has made many discoveries relating to famous watchmakers such as Ferdinand Berthoud”, enthuses Joël A. Grandjean, President of the Henri Grandjean Association.

Dr. Helmut Crott: “Every great collector is quite surely going to have an Henri Grandjean in his or her collection”

Worldwide virtual museum, successful investigations

True to the founding aims of the “Henri Grandjean, Valeurs & Héritages” Association, which are to promote the work of a leading watchmaker of his generation, the Association has been conducting an ambitious historical research campaign for over five years.

First, thanks to the opinion of the much-followed watch collector Dr. Helmut Crott, author of the famous reference book “Le Cadran” and inventor of horological auctions: “Every great collector is quite surely going to have an Henri Grandjean in his or her collection,” declared this unrivalled specialist in pocket watches. Then with a warm welcome from the Château des Monts watchmaking museum in Le Locle, which houses not only a number of milestone timepieces signed by the famous chronometer-maker, but also a Henri Grandjean Fund of rare documentary material.

Finally, between 2023 and 2024, the Association has called upon the expertise of a renowned historian who has been conducting research into 18th-century watchmaking history for many years: Rossella Baldi, a former Project Manager at the Neuchâtel University, who has made significant discoveries about several Neuchâtel watchmakers and about chronometry. “The historical information gathered by this historian, who directed the MIH’s study center (the Musée d’Horlogerie de la Chaux-de-Fonds) is a real treasure trove: it will be at the heart of the Association’s future communications,” Joël A. Grandjean promises.

2022 auction: up 290% in value!

In November 2022, the watch auction house Antiquorum has achieved an unexpected feat: priced at CHF 55,000, the Henri Grandjean de poche, a mechanical timepiece with a rare combination of 8 complications, topped the CHF 155,000 threshold, joining Patek Philippe, Rolex, A. Lange & Söhne and Audemars Piguet in the top 10 of this momentous sale.

Thanks to Rossella Baldi’s network, the Association Henri Grandjean was able to approach the purchaser, a great English connoisseur. She confirmed to the British collector a finding based on her historical research: the watch was made over ten years earlier than advertised at the auction. Indeed, this outstanding timepiece was crafted around 1874-1875 and exhibited in 1876 at the first Universal Exhibition in Philadelphia. At the time, the international press already featured it prominently, 146 years before its reappearance at the 2022 auction.

No sooner had it gone online than Henri Grandjean’s official after-sales service started collecting data on watches owned by private individuals and collectors around the world