Grand Complications watchmaker Minute Repeater Artisan

[A sustained note in the background]

(On-screen text: Chopard presents)

If someone had said to me at watchmaking school that I would work on minute repeaters at Chopard, I'd never have believed them.

(Close-up of Christophe wearing an eyepiece, of the inner workings of a timepiece.)

It was my holy grail to work on pieces like this.

(On-screen text: ART, from the Latin ARS, ARTIS. Talent, skill, dexterity.)

[Soft piano music plays]

(On-screen text: The word ART becomes ARTISAN.)

(On-screen text: From expertise to emotion. Chopard)

(A black and white graphite sketch of the palm of a hand, surrounded by the words EXPERTISE, CREATIVITY, EMOTION.)

I'm amazed at what the hand can do, particularly in precision work with such small parts.

(A portrait of Christophe.)

(On-screen text: Christophe, Grand Complications Watchmaker)

(On-screen text: Pre-assembling)

(Christophe opens a box of tiny parts and begins to assemble them with dainty tools.)

I am a watchmaker in the Grandes Complications workshop. I think watchmaking is a real vocation. I've always aspired to it. My home still has dismantled clocks. As a child, I wanted to see how they worked. We're pretty much the ones who finish the job, but beforehand, a lot of work is done to make all these parts correctly, so we can assemble them and ensure they work well. We receive the watch in separate parts, so we have over 500 parts in little boxes. And we assemble them from the beginning until the watch is finished, inspected and approved. It's amazing that we manage to fit all these parts in the movement.

(On-screen text: Movement assembly)

When you look at them all and realise they all need to fit within such a small space, it's quite incredible, but we manage it with time and perseverance.

(Christophe gently lowers the balance into the movement.)

Working on Poinçon de Genève watches requires us to be more cautious, more attentive to the parts with all their extra decoration. It's a real team effort. Some think we work all alone, but that's not true. We help each other a lot. We all have different perspectives on what's happening, and it's important to talk so we can continually improve.

(On-screen text: Casing)

You need around 10 years experience with complicated watches before you can assemble a minute repeater, because it's a mechanism that's hard to adjust to ensure the hours, quarters and minutes chime the right number of times exactly when they should. And I believe this can only be done by the human hand.

(Christophe winds his finished timepiece.)

[The chimes sound]

(On-screen text: Chopard - The artisan of emotions - Since 1860)