Métiers d'Art — the Masterful Art of Decoration: Part One

How much do you know about the unique decorative techniques?

Nowadays the term Métiers d'Art is used to describe the mastery of more than one specific form of exquisite craftsmanship. It implies all the rarest and most complicated techniques which are exist. The art of decorating watch dials was almost lost forever during the last century when the stamped brass disks of dial blanks began to be painted or galvanized automatically.

Paradoxical as it may seem, the return of artisan dials to the market was directly connected with a fact that luxury watches began to be seen directly as art object. Today, the decoration of watch dials can be divided into five main disciplines: enameling, marquetry, lacquering, stone patterns, and high-tech techniques.  

Enamel, Marquetry and Feather Art

Grand Feu is the most fundamental form of enamel craft which has been practiced since Ancient Egyptian times. Crushed glass is applied in powdered form to a surface usually made of metal and fired in an oven. Various different additives in the powder allow enamelers achieve a glassy surface in almost any color.

It was only in the early 2000s that the alchemists at Jaquet Droz managed to achieve pure snow white and jet black dials with the help of powerful financing from the Swatch Group laboratories who spared no expense.

The layer of enamel will remain transparent if no pigmented ingredients are added to the powder, in which case it's referred to as flinqué enamel. This see-through layer is used to coat paintings on dials created using heat-resistant paints, which is how miniature enamel paintings are produced.

Cloisonné enameling (from the French "cloisons", meaning “partitions” or “compartments”) is probably the most complicated technique. The enameler must first carve out the shape of the pattern on the dial's surface. These grooves must then be soldered with the most delicate of metal strips or wires about one millimeter thick (usually gold).

Vitreous enamel paste is then poured into the resulting cellular spaces outlined by the wire. The first layer of enamel shrinks down significantly after it's been fired, and further layers of enamel need to be applied one after the other to even out the surface so that it's level with the pattern — only measured by eye.

Champlevé is another ancient technique which is far from straightforward. Russian artisans in the 12th century were among those who mastered it. Troughs or cells are cut in the surface to form the intended motif. These cells are filled with vitreous enamel of different colors and the piece is then fired a number of times in an oven until a rich color is achieved.

Miniature firing equipment has made life a little easier for enamelers working with this technique, which are now used to melt the mixture in each cell. The revived technique of paillonné (from the French "spangled") demands a huge amount of experience and skill from enamelers. It essentially involves gradually applying a pattern or motif in layers, and can begin with a guilloché pattern at the base coated with translucent colored enamel.

Paillons — tiny motifs masterfully hand-cut from the thinnest pieces of gold leaf —  are then applied on top of the translucent colored enamel. This is followed by a final coating with a transparent layer of fondant enamel. Paillonné requires multiple firings, and overdoing it by just a few degrees can turn a potential masterpiece into a piece of overcooked scrap. Jaquet Droz has unveiled three different models with dials decorated using this astounding technique.

Marquetry is also experiencing a revival. Simply put, this decorative technique is a patchwork of uncommon materials, such as straw, a special kind of rye or dried and colored rose petals. Even the wing covers (elytra) of scarab beetles have been used! 

The maisons that pride themselves on making these kinds of dials are Vacheron Constantin, Van Cleef & Arpels and Dior. Few have mastered the technique of feather art. Breathtaking dials comprised of colorful bird feathers can be seen on watches by Cartier, Parmigiani, Harry Winston, and of course Dior.

Stone Patterns

Dials blanketed in semi-precious stones with uniquely cut patterns are being seen more and more often these days. Jadeites and onyx dials are the most popular. But watch brands are reaching new heights every year, such as the dial for Parmigiani's Toric Quaestor Labyrinthe minute repeater which was decorated with Burmese jade. Meteorites have pride of place when it comes to stone textures.

The Swiss watchmaker Rolex sparked a fashion trend for meteorite watches when an Oyster Day-Date model was introduced in 1999 with a dial made of pieces of the Gibeon meteorite. Rolex releases meteorite watches from time to time but it's even this technological powerhouse finds it difficult to churn out meteorite dials by the dozen. A meteorite's crystal structure is extremely unstable and totally unpredictable.

They say it takes at least fifty failed attempts before a one-and-only successful meteorite dial is made. They can't be fashioned using any of the existing modern machinery — everything needs to be done by hand.

Omega is another fan of meteorites. In 2016, the company presented yet another version of its signature moon watches called the Speedmaster Grey Side Of The Moon "Meteorite", which used a piece of the very same Gibeon meteorite which impacted in Namibia as its plate.

This meteorite displays what are referred to as Widmanstätten patterns, named in honor of the Austrian scientist who discovered them. These are geometrical patterns comprised of interleaving bands or lamellae. The crystalline pattern is made visible on the surface of the dial as a result of acid etching.

Meanwhile, Jaeger-LeCoultre and Parmigiani take occasional trips to Sweden to shave off bits of the Muonionalusta meteorite, which is over four and a half billion years old. It hit Earth approximately 800,000 years ago and was discovered in the Arctic Circle in 1906 near the present Swedish-Finnish border. Jaeger-LeCoultre put its piece of the meteorite in an annual calendar called the Master Calendar Meteorite, which has a moon-phase display and a 39 mm case made of pink gold and steel.

The main gimmick of the Parmigiani Tonda 1950 Météorite is that Michel Parmigiani somehow found a way to add color to meteorite dials. The model comes in blue, black and white dial versions. Their surfaces also display the typical Widmanstätten pattern. Another historic technique which has been revived and one worth mentioning is commesso, also referred to as Florentine mosaic — a pattern pieced together with stones which are subsequently melted.

It's a tremendously difficult and unpredictable technique. Not only can the tiniest of invisible internal cracks or fragment of foreign material in the stone distort the color of the motif, it can also ruin its structure.

Other jewelry-watch crafts can also be discussed under the heading of stone techniques. The latest trend is to use precious stones of different sizes with various different cuts to decorate the same watch. Practically all the elite brands are good at this.

However, the brand Corum has probably gone further than all the rest with its Admiral’s Cup Legend 38 Haute Joaillerie model for her. Diamonds of different sizes with several cuts have been set in this watch with the help of some secret know-how.

In a nutshell, a silver-based alloy is poured onto the dial before it's encrusted with jewels, and a machine records the precise moment when the silver hasn't set yet but doesn't threaten to turn the diamonds into coal. That's when the press tool sets the stones into the metal forever.

Another achievement made by watch jewelers is in working with mother-of-pearl — a naturally fragile material with an unstable structure. If one crack appears in the inner shell layer it'll immediately begin to crumble until nothing is left but dust.

That's why mother-of pearl dials with waves cut by diamond markings and similar artfully added tricks are considered top-of-the-range. Rolex, Omega, Van Cleef & Arpels and Dior have made the most advances in this field.

That's why mother-of pearl dials with waves cut by diamond markings and similar artfully added tricks are considered top-of-the-range. Rolex, Omega, Van Cleef & Arpels and Dior have made the most advances in this field.