18ct yellow gold Agassiz, enamel cased Cloisonné fob watch - made for the Chinese market. Circa 1890

‘Agassiz’ began when Auguste Agassiz began working for ‘Comptoir Horloger Raiguel Jeune’ in St-Imier, a trader of watch parts. Agassiz took over the business in 1832. The business used the cottage-Industry method of employing people to make or process watch parts in their home. A jobber would then come to each house, collect the parts and assemble them.

The company was then taken over by Agassiz’s nephew, Ernest Francillon in 1852 where it shifted to the factory method of creating watches. Here, Francillon began doing a lot of market research and started off by making regular 19’’’ watch movements however, as demand grew from wholesalers and, pressured to innovate and bring something new to the market, the company began developing smaller, thinner watches. First was the 17’’’ movement with a thickness of only ²⁴/_12th (2mm) followed by ²⁰/_12th (1.6mm) then a thickness of just ¹⁷/_12th (1.4mm). The Agassiz factory was highly praised by its many demanding customers for such thin, high quality movements.