A key player in training and the economy, Joux Valley Technical College (Ecole Technique de la Vallée de Joux) has been able to adapt to the changing face of watchmaking over the decades. Celebrating its 111th anniversary this year, the college has trained several generations of watchmakers.

From miniaturisation to extreme mechanical sophistication, via mechanisation and the arrival of electronics, watchmakers have lived through changes and revolutions in their industry throughout their working lives. In this shifting landscape, they have kept alive the memory of their time at the College in the form of their end-of-study “masterpiece”, also known as the “school watch”.

The development and diversity of these “masterpieces” allows us to retrace this history in which the times change while the watchmakers remain.