It was 1846 when the visionary Ulysse Nardin, with the idea of developing marine chronometers for navigation, founded a company named after him in Le Locle, in the Jura mountains. And it is here that the brand still has its headquarters today, in a historic building on rue Jardin where it moved in 1865.
A four-storey building with traditional façades and windows that let in natural light. Spaces housing various departments, including the final inspection department, and also boasting a new private showroom opened a couple of years ago.
A pioneer in avant-garde technologies and the use of innovative materials, Ulysse Nardin is one of the few manufactures to have the necessary expertise to produce its components and high-precision movements in-house. Crucial to this is the La Chaux-de-Fonds factory: a 1970s building acquired in 2003.
Not forgetting the Donzé Cadrans manufacture for enamelling dials, acquired by Ulysse Nardin in 2011, and Sigatec for the production of silicon micromechanical components, of which the watchmaker is a founding member.
This material has become central to the brand, which in 2001 presented Freak, the first watch with a silicon escapement, and now regularly uses components made of this material.
