” Today, the object watch has another meaning. ”

Derived from the Russian word “troika”, a team of three, atelier oï was founded in 1991 in La Neuveville, Switzerland, by Aurel Aebi, Armand Louis and Patrick Reymond. With a team spirit and an intimate relationship with the material, atelier oï has been working for 30 years to dissolve barriers between genres and promote transdisciplinary creativity.

Born from an intuitive and emotional affinity between the three founders, atelier oï works in the fields of architecture, interior architecture, product design and scenography, with a collaboration between disciplines, creating holistic solutions from object to space. The co-founders have a strong interest in nature and natural materials, and their expertise in transforming these allows them to carry out both emotional and artisanal projects.

The three founders are architects, designers and boat builders, all members of the Federation of Swiss Architects FAS and headed the Swiss Design Awards as President of the Federal Design Commission between 2008 and 2016. Trained at the school of architecture funded by Alberto Sartoris in Switzerland, the founders also received honorary doctorates from this institution.

atelier oï encourages experimentation and cultural exchange, through their work with clients and their own initiatives, and as visiting professors in a number of leading institutions, including ETH Zurich, ECAL Renens, the Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts and the Kuwasawa Design School in Tokyo.

The combination of local roots and international know-how has enabled atelier oï to design objects for a wide variety of national and international clients, including Artemide, B&B Italia, Bulgari, Foscarini, Louis Vuitton, Nespresso, Pringle of Scotland, Rimowa, USM and WonderGlass. atelier oï has also organised monographic exhibitions of its work in Zurich, São Paulo and Tokyo. atelier oï is also working on a humanitarian project for Smiling Gecko in Cambodia.

atelier oï’s projects have been recognised globally and have won some of the most prestigious awards including multiple IF Design Awards, Europan 3 Award, European Museum of the Year Award, Red Dot Award and the product of the year award from Architectural Record.

Olivier Mosset was born in Bern in 1944 and entered the art world in the early 1960s. He worked as an assistant to Jean Tinguely and then Daniel Spoerri. He arrived in Paris in 1963 and began to question the meaning of art and the role of the artist and took up painting.

At first, Olivier Mosset painted small formats with the letter “A”. Then came some of his emblematic motifs, including a black circle on a white background, which he painted 200 times between 1966 and 1974, his way of reaching degree zero in painting.
In December 1966, he founded the B.M.P.T group in Paris, with Daniel Buren, Michel Parmentier and Niele Toroni. The group disbanded in December 1967, but Olivier Mosset’s art remained radical, culminating in monochromes where “there’s nothing left to see” (Jean Baudrillard). He left Paris for New York in 1977. He frequented the counterculture, multiplying his collaborations. Olivier Mosset now lives and works in Tucson, Arizona.

The Konstantin Chaykin watch Manufacture was founded in 2003. It specialises in producing complicated, intricate Haute Horlogerie and collector’s pieces. Its founder is the world-famous watchmaker and inventor Konstantin Chaykin. He was the first watchmaker in Russia to produce both clocks and wristwatches with tourbillons, and the first in the world to make a Computus clock indicating the dates of Orthodox Easter. Konstantin Chaykin has 94 registered patents – more than any other watchmaker in the world.

The entire Konstantin Chaykin collection is based on the master’s own inventions and embodies the creative freedom and progressive spirit of philosophy, design and technology.

In 2010 Konstantin Chaykin became the first and, so far, the only Russian member of the Watchmaking Academy of Independent Creators (AHCI – Académie Horlogère des Créateurs Indépendants). From 2016 to 2019 he served as the President of the Academy.

In 2017, Konstantin Chaykin watches were for the first time shortlisted for the prestigious Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève. In 2018, the Clown wristwatch was awarded the Audacity prize at the GPHG. The Joker Automaton (2018), the Minotaur (2021) and the Harley Quinn (2022) models were also shortlisted.

Konstantin Chaykin’s works are a fixture of the renowned Only Watch auction. In 2021, the Martian Tourbillon became the most expensive Russian-made watch ever sold.

Born of a lifelong passion for all things horological, The Horophile is Amr Sindi’s alter ego; a journey down the rabbit hole of independent and creative watchmaking.

Founded in 2013, The Horophile has a mission to turn the spotlight on lesser-known brands and creators while also bringing forth his own aesthetic sensibilities.

A candid voice within the watch-collecting community as well as a behind-the-scenes consultant to numerous watchmakers and independents, The Horophile has collaborated with many brands over the years to reinterpret their models and bring their work to a wider audience with sincerity and conviction.

Massena LAB, founded by noted watch collector and industry veteran William Massena, is a creative horological studio that designs, develops, and produces timepieces, often in collaboration with respected watchmakers from around the world.

Massena LAB exists to be a reference point of horological culture and to play an integral part in its constant evolution, using elements of style from the past to enhance the future of watchmaking. It aims to create and nurture a community of informed watch enthusiasts with a passion for novel timepieces from independent watchmakers.

The “LAB” in Massena LAB is a combination of two words: “laboratory,” for the willingness to experiment and embrace new ideas, and “collaboration,” for the fruitful, long-standing relationships that Massena LAB enjoys with its partner brands.

“Disruptive, provocative, rebellious? No! A little dissonant, maybe, and undeniably spontaneous.”

seconde/seconde/ (real name Romaric André) prefers his adjectives more old-fashioned than overused. And his penchant for things of the past seems to run through most of his work. It was his passion for vintage watches that led him to develop the hand swap several years ago.

Now his signature, the hand swap principle is “a watchmaking game, aesthetically radical but technically harmless, where you replace one or more hands on an existing watch”.

seconde/seconde/ mostly takes on watches from major brands from the 1950s, 60s and 70s, making the contrast created by his hand swap all the more striking. Patinated dials showing the signs of time are electrified by hands with a colour-saturated design, for a visibly anachronistic result.

“At first, I am guided by a drive for irreverence. And I am here to disrupt an age-old balance, to break a preliminary harmony. It’s quite exhilarating to unseat the product: deconstructing the piece first, then reconstructing it to reveal an unknown side of it. In every watch, I see an opportunity to bring out a whole new perspective, whether serious or lighter in nature.”

All the hands redesigned by seconde/seconde/ say something about the watches they decorate, or else they come to strike a chord that is sometimes sensitive. In his deceptively naive aesthetic, poetry and irony are never far from each other.

Since 2011, the Label Noir brand has chosen personalization and its plural arts as its credo, in compliance with watchmaking History and its fundamentals.

With its master craftsmanship and the most prestigious techniques, the brand fulfils both conventional desires and the most extravagant follies. On his way, memorable encounters, confessions expressed through manufacturing options. The achievement of human or technical challenges.

Emmanuel Curti is a watchmaker at the helm of Label Noir, having forged his skills on the workbenches and decision-making offices of three of Switzerland’s leading watch manufacturers. Coming from the additional worlds of restoration, quality control or new products development, he has a passion for the plural arts of personalization.

Collectors love him, they share their passion for iconic models that he does not hesitate to metamorphose and customize.

” As far as I remember, I have always been doing mechanics. As a child, I dreamt of understanding, designing and crafting wacky mechanical items. My creations speak my mind and thanks to them, I can share my universe with other human beings. ”

Vianney Halter was born in 1963 on the outskirts of Paris, the son of an engine driver on the French railways. Perhaps this early contact with powerful locomotives, steam engines and other measuring instruments is the reason why he was attracted to technology and mechanics.

At 14 years of age, Vianney Halter took the train to the capital to enrol at the Paris Watchmaking School. He qualified in 1980 and spent his first ten years in the profession restoring antique watches and clocks, experience which gave him in-depth knowledge of the art of watchmaking.

Self-employed since 1984, he then went on to create a variety of timepieces for well-known manufacturers including Harry Winston, Breguet, and Audemars Piguet. He has also invented and developed his own collection of wristwatches since 1998.

His designs have been regarded as avant-garde pieces and are considered to have instigated a new shift in the watchmaking world. Vianney Halter makes unusual watches in the traditional method of the master watchmakers of the past, while using singular aesthetics, his own technical patents and unique constructions. All of this is illustrated in his first model, the “Antiqua”, a perpetual calendar presented in 1998. This watch was instantly regarded as a “relic of the future”, reinforcing Halter’s creativity and allowing him to enter the Académie Horlogère des Créateurs Indépendants (AHCI).

His years as an independent watchmaker continuing the art of watchmaking and his contribution to the modern horological landscape have already earned him nine awards. He has created around ten models of wristwatches, but the high level of workmanship they demand means their production is confidential. Indeed, under 500 pieces created by Vianney Halter have been produced to this day.

The quality of his expertise has also earned him a place among the figures selected to appear in the official White Paper (the Livre Blanc) of the Fondation de la Haute Horlogerie, which aims to set the boundaries of the restricted circle surrounding technical and precious fine watchmaking.

Vianney Halter works as an artist does, expressing his creativity and style through the skills he masters: those belonging to the art of horological construction.

‘’ Freedom is born once you go beyond the rules ’’

Born in Switzerland, from a family in the Valais canton, Eric has retained from his upbringing a deep attachment to nature, an exceptional capacity for work and a profound respect for authenticity. Cradled by love and joy from a young age, he has nurtured his natural joie de vivre and let his gregarious personality shine through. Coupled with an early exposure, via his parents, to music, literature, painting and architecture, this has opened up in him a unique sensitivity, combining high-tech and nature.

In 1989, he opens his own architecture practice. He soon extends his realm of expertise to graphic design and packaging through collaboration with several design offices. He creates products as diverse as writing instruments, lighting fixtures, furniture, accessories, phones & even computer screens. In 1997, he sketches his first watch and his passion for this has grown ever since.

In 1998, he establishes his own watch design office and can henceforth let his artistic sensitivity, his architectural mastery and his creativity flow freely. Architect through and through, he works in cross-sections always keeping the achievable and the aim in mind. His relentless search for deep consistency, over and above pure harmony, quickly earned him the esteem and the recognition of the whole industry.

Since 2015, he is a member of the Cultural Council of the Fondation de la Haute Horlogerie in style, design and artistic expertise. He collaborates with the most prestigious brands and even though he does not actively look to be in the spotlight, his creations have been acknowledged by numerous prizes.