EMMANUEL BOUCHET

Born in 1963 in the Franco-Swiss border village of Charmauvillers, Emmanuel Bouchet represents the living bridge between French and Swiss watchmaking traditions. Having engineered numerous masterpieces and complications, including the Harry Winston Opus 12, Emmanuel Bouchet is the founder and genius watchmaker behind his brand.

Slowing Time with Complications

"Life is just a moment, a passing hour, a fleeting day." — The words that started it all. Bouchet is a visionary capable of reimagining time itself, and his timepieces present a philosophy that encourages the wearer to pause and witness the mechanical poetry of each passing second.

Bouchet's defining innovation is placing the escapement—the very heart of mechanical timekeeping—at center stage. In the Complication One, an auxiliary transmission escapement sits prominently on the dial, performing one oscillation every 15 seconds—75 times slower than conventional escapements. This creates a hypnotic, deliberate rhythm that transforms timekeeping into an art of mindfulness.

Deconstruction of Time
Rather than traditional hands, Bouchet employs jumping indicators that move instantaneously rather than sweeping. The Complication One features: Jumping hours at 8 o'clock Decimal minutes (0-9) with a retrograde tens-of-minutes hand at 4 o'clock An oversized small seconds with integrated day/night indicator at 12 o'clock This five-level division of time—day/night, hours, ten minutes, minutes, and seconds—symbolizes Bouchet's belief that even the largest temporal cycles are composed of tiny, equally important moments.

To power these energy-intensive jumping complications, Bouchet developed movements with independent gear trains driven by separate mainspring barrels. This ensures that the complex display mechanisms never compromise the precision of the timekeeping escapement.

Every Emmanuel Bouchet timepiece is 100% Swiss-made in the Les Bayards workshop in the Neuchâtel mountains. Each component receives weeks of hand-finishing—from skeletonization and chamfering to the hand-setting of precious stones on the Source collection's rotating cones. The movements, developed entirely in-house without modules, feature between 283 and 400+ components depending on the complication.