160 Years Written within the Stars: The Zenith Odyssey

For the true watch fanatic, the story of Zenith shouldn’t be merely a timeline of calibres and case shapes; it’s a narrative of audacity and continuity. Nicely, it’s a story of calibres and watches but it surely has a that means that speaks on to the explanation folks acquire watches.

Because the Manufacture in Le Locle celebrates its A hundred and sixtieth anniversary in 2025, we glance again at a legacy outlined by a single, upward gaze — the identical gaze that impressed a younger visionary to call his firm after the best level within the evening sky. Not his personal title, however a really perfect or purpose.

One night, struck by the complexity of the cosmos, he noticed his mechanics as a mirror of the celestial order, adopting the title Zenith and the five-pointed star as his image. However we’re getting forward of ourselves as a result of Favre-Jacot was not only a starry-eyed dreamer however a sensible industrial wizard.

The story begins in 1865, within the frosty Jura mountains. Whereas the Swiss watchmaking business relied on a fragmented system of institution – the place scattered artisans made particular person elements – 22-year-old Georges Favre-Jacot dreamt of unity. He constructed the primary true manufacture in historical past, bringing each self-discipline of watchmaking beneath one roof in Le Locle. His purpose was not simply effectivity, however the creation of the “good watch.” In its heyday, the manufacture sparked a change in how Swiss watchmaking organised itself.

This foundational resolution to combine all expertise, what we name vertical integration immediately, is what allowed Zenith to develop into the “Grasp of Chronometry.” By the mid-Twentieth century, the model had amassed an unbeaten document of two,333 chronometry prizes, a testomony to an obsession with precision that is still the model’s heartbeat immediately.

Savior within the Attic

In fact, no story about Swiss watchmaking is full with out wholesome servings of drama. Zenith’s story of triumphs is accompanied by turns in the direction of catastrophe. Thus, no fanatic’s retelling of Zenith is full with out the legend of Charles Vermot.

When the Quartz Disaster threatened to erase mechanical watchmaking within the Nineteen Seventies, it was Vermot, a humble chronograph specialist, who defied orders to scrap the tooling for the legendary El Primero. He secretly hid the presses and plans within the manufacture’s attic.

Vermot’s act of insurrection saved the world’s first high-frequency computerized chronograph—launched in 1969 and beating at 36,000 vph or 5 Hz – making certain that Zenith’s mechanical coronary heart would beat on. Right now, that coronary heart nonetheless beats and has established Zenith as a maker of correctly iconic chronographs.

The El Primero has additionally developed to beat sooner than ever, changing into the El Primero 9004. This motion is able to measuring 1/one centesimal of a second, with a second escapement devoted to the chronograph that beats on the phenomenal charge of 360,000 vph or 50 Hz.

Thus, Zenith’s A hundred and sixtieth anniversary isn’t just a celebration of survival, however of simultaneous continuity and revival. It’s why the manufacture not solely started in Le Locle, it stayed there and stays there immediately. It was the largest within the canton of Neuchatel and stays a formidable complicated of 18 buildings. It’s onerous to think about immediately however most of Swiss watchmaking is not the place it started, marking Zenith as actually uncommon.

Swept alongside by the ebb and circulate of time, watchmaking’s industrial centres devolved into one thing resembling the provider community of the institutionsolely to be pressured into consolidation by the Quartz Disaster, then to fragment once more. It’s now as soon as extra on the crest of a wave of vertical integration. For its half, Zenith remained anchored in Le Locle, from the troublesome occasions all by to the renaissance of conventional watchmaking in early 21^st century.

In 2025, Zenith created a bodily manifestation of its unyielding bridge between previous and current within the type of the G.F.J. watch. A tribute to its founder, the watch may but be a beacon on that bridge, lighting the way in which ahead in the direction of a hopeful future.

Powered by a contemporary re-engineering of the famed Calibre 135 – essentially the most awarded motion within the golden age of observatory competitions – this platinum masterpiece lately received the Chronometry Prize on the 2025 Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève (GPHG). With a dial of deep lapis lazuli and a “brick” guilloché motif mimicking the manufacture’s façade, it serves as a tangible hyperlink between the Fifties chronometry battles and up to date haute horlogerie.

From the attic of the manufacture to the rostrum of the GPHG, Zenith proves that its story remains to be being written. It’s a story of those that don’t simply measure time, however dare to achieve for the star that guides them.

The Defy Excessive Lapis Lazuli

Precision That Radiates in Blue

If the G.F.J. represents the classical previous, the Defy Excessive Lapis Lazuli embodies the novel future. Launched as a part of the A hundred and sixtieth-anniversary celebrations, this restricted version of fifty items is a high-frequency wristwatch that fuses the model’s celestial inspiration with brutalist structure.

• The Dial: A slice of the cosmos. The openworked dial options counters crafted from lapis lazuli, a stone chosen for its deep celestial blue and pure pyrite inclusions that shimmer like distant stars. No two dials are alike.

• The Engine: The El Primero 9004 calibre. It options two impartial escapements: one beating at 5Hz (36,000 vph) for the time, and a second beating at a staggering 50Hz (360,000 vph) for the chronograph. This enables the central hand to make a full rotation each second, carving time into 1/one centesimal of a second slices.

• The Armour: A 45mm case of polished stainless-steel contrasted with a microblasted yellow gold dodecagonal bezel and pusher protectors, making a heat, matte radiance. That bezel itself is a two-piece marvel, with the highest half in stainless-steel.

Like many up to date Zenith creations, the strap for the Defy Excessive Lapis Lazuli is effortlessly interchangeable. There are three choices right here, all included: a metal bracelet; a black embossed rubber strap with folding clasp; and a black Velcro strap.

Limitation: 50 items

Worth: 32,900 CHF

For extra data, head to Zenith’s official web site right here.

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