Abraham Favre first learned the ins and outs of watchmaking back in 1718. It took a while but he officially established his own watchmaking company in 1737. One of the benchmarks of the company was its affliation with Jacques-Frédéric Hourriet, the father of Swiss chronometry. This collaboration led to watches of impeccable design and notable innovations. The company enjoyed an even bigger success when Favre welcomed the Leubas, a renowned family of watchmakers. The partnership resulted to international recognition having opened shops in United States, Bahrain, Chile, India, Lebanon, and Singapore.
By the 1960s, Favre-Leuba was releasing about 650,000 watches per year. The brand, at that time, was at its pinnacle. Bivouac was introduced in 1962 as a watch perfect for mountaineers with its altimeter and aneroid barometer. Only four years after, Favre-Leuba created Bathy, the first watch for divers with mechanical depth gauge and a mechanism indicating the dive-time.
After its golden years, Favre-Leuba experienced a dark age for almost 30 years. For some time, ownership of the company changed hand and not all of the owners were interested in returning the brand to its previous glory. It was not until 2006, when Clément Brunet-Moret relaunched the brand, that watch collectors can expect the same greatness from Favre-Leuba. The CEO was determined to relive the brand's distinguished past by releasing previous watches with timely innovations and by limiting the production to less than 2,000 per year. Through this, the brand becomes exclusive making it more appealing to collectors. However, owing to the financial crisis, the co went into closure again and the watch was never launched into the market. Only some small samples were made for the local distributor which were never distributed or sold..
http://www.favre-leuba.ch/#/en/collections/
http://www.swisstime.ch/pgs/rwi-pgs-actu-lgs-en-ida-1107.html
This watch has a special meaning as it was a gift from my company for the project Haiku.
