Think COSC’s chronometer certification, METAS’s ‘Master Chronometer’, or even Geneva’s ‘Poinçon’ seal of fine hand-finish are exacting? Well, 20 years ago, Chopard and its Fleurier neighbours Parmigiani (plus Vaucher manufacture) and Bovet thought that things could still be improved upon.
Chopard is celebrating 20 years of their collective ‘Qualité Fleurier’ foundation, deep in the verdant Val de Travers with a commemorative ‘L.U.C’ timepiece. This Swiss certification was set up in 2005 because all three believed that existing certifications didn’t recognise the superior quality of their own particularly exacting watchmaking.
In order to be recognised by the FQF as ‘Qualité Fleurier’, which is the first qualitive horological certification for completed watches (COSC’s three facilities only test bare movements, and mostly Rolex and Omega ones at that), you must be 100% Swiss made, be duly certified by COSC (‘Le Contrôle Officiel Suisse des Chronomètres’, set up in the Seventies) and the finishing needs to be to ‘Poinçon’ haute horlogerie standards (which is where Chopard’s Meyrin facility in the Genevan north suburbs provides geographical qualification).
Then there are the tests at the FQF’s historic chalet in Fleurier. The so-called ‘Fleuritest’ is a 24-hour operating test that checks the accuracy of the completed watch using a robotics simulator, which recreates the movements of a nycthermeral cycle – the alternation between active or extremely active phases and calmer ones that mimic a day on the wrist. Even the rapid oscillation of one’s wrist when brushing one’s teeth.
To pass, the watch must be accurate to 0/+5 seconds a day in five positions. The additional ‘Chronofiable’ test measures durability. It tests the watch’s aging cycle, measures the pull-and-push forces on the crown stem, and, if the watch is a chronograph or diving watch it measures the forces exerted on the push buttons and the bezel. It also tests magnetic, water and shock resistance.
To celebrate two unrelenting decades of aforementioned abuse, Chopard has unveiled a new ‘L.U.C’, from the Scheufele family jeweller’s horological hothouse, named after the Genevan maison’s founder Louis Ulysse Chopard. Its collection was a passion project of company scion Karl-Friedrich, to focus on high-end watchmaking, superlative craftsmanship and to house Chopard’s first in-house movement.
This latest iteration is no exception. The sector-type dial mimics that of the first Qualité Fleurier L.U.C to be certified, except, instead of being in contrast black and white it is brass with a lovely tobacco-shade hour marker ring. The 18ct ethical rose-gold 39mm case is an elegantly slim 8.92mm and the individually welded lugs that were one of the standout details of the first Qualité Fleurier L.U.C remain.
The chocolate leather strap gives the timepiece a retro aesthetic something that contrasts with the inclusion of SuperLuminova that top the hour markers and are on the hands. The movement, highly decorated of course, is the calibre L.U.C 96, a direct descendant of the L.U.C 96.01-L, the cornerstone of the L.U.C collection and designed in 1996 by none other than Michel Parmigiani, under a brief from the Scheufele family.
A pleasing touch of symmetry, given this launch’s inherently localised poignancy.
Chopard L.U.C Qualité Fleurier 20th Anniversary Edition, limited to 20; $32,300 / £27,700; chopard.com