ne year ago, Kari Voutilainen told us that his dream of creating a “House of guillochage” was about to become reality. The art of guillochage or engine-turning – by hand, obviously – is threatened with extinction. Since the end of the 1950s, no hand-operated rose-engine lathes have been built and there are no schools that teach the art. As a result, master engine-turners or guillocheurs have become an endangered species.

However, thanks in large part to Kari Voutilainen, the most noble art of guillochage is now rising from what almost became its ashes. Young artisans are taking up the craft and the rare few watchmaking houses that still practice it seriously have their order books full. After years of watchmaking “striptease”, when it was the done thing to reveal all the intimate details of the movement, the watch face – the dial – is returning to centre stage. (You can read more about this in Hubert de Haro’s comprehensive report, published in Europa Star’s recent “Dial Issue”, 2/2024, available for our subscribers here.)

Silver dial with guilloché decorations: “Sola” motif in the centre, 24-division sunburst behind the hour markers.

As we mentioned, Kari Voutilainen has played a significant role in the revival of guillochage. The modesty of his output – 60 to 70 watches per year – is inversely proportional to the influence that his timepieces have had and continue to have on the industry. By focusing his exquisite dials around the consummate art of engine-turning, Kari set the tone. He has inspired a host of brands in every price segment to experiment with guillochage. This can be hand-executed on a lathe though it is more likely to be done by machine or with a stamping tool – but they’re all “doing a Voutilainen”, to coin a phrase.

Kari Voutilainen has also demonstrated that guillochage – a decorative technique that actually dates back millennia, to a time well before watches – is the perfect complement to even the most contemporary styles. This is evident from the CSW Voutilainen watch, which sold for CHF 450,000 at the recent Only Watch charity auction.

Mechanical and stylistic continuity

Guillochage was a feature of the very first piece crafted entirely by Kari Voutilainen. This remarkable tourbillon pocket watch was completed thirty years ago, in 1994, after some 2,000 hours of mainly nocturnal work. During the day, Kari Voutilainen was busy in Michel Parmigiani’s workshop, making one-off or very limited series complication watches.

But this pocket watch got him noticed. Presented at an exhibition organised by Girard-Perregaux in La Chaux-de-Fonds in 1996, it earned Kari orders for several unique pieces and paved the way for him to strike out on his own. Ten years later, in 2004, exactly 20 years ago, he founded his own brand.Since then this independence has continued to assert itself and grow in strength, on the back of a strategic intelligence that is as rare as it is intuitive and discreet.

To celebrate twenty years as an independent watchmaker, Voutilainen is launching a series of 61 tourbillon wristwatches directly inspired by this original pocket watch, the foundation stone of his business. There is one piece in steel, 20 in platinum, 20 in white gold and 20 in red gold.

Both architecturally and technically, the TBL22 tourbillon movement that powers this series is a direct descendent of the one-minute tourbillon from 1994. As in the original piece, the two barrels that power it are directly connected to the centre wheel pinion, so as to use an equitable proportion of the power reserve.

This elegantly constructed layout, which reveals the tourbillon in full, allows the watch to maintain a regular and constant amplitude throughout its 72-hour power reserve. The tourbillon itself is also directly inspired by the one from 30 years ago, whose steel cage was entirely crafted, meticulously polished and finished by Kari, by hand, like everything else in the watch. The only exception was the engine-turned dial, which at the time he entrusted to one of the few remaining artisans with the necessary skills.

Entirely designed, developed, manufactured and assembled in the Voutilainen workshops, the TBL22 tourbillon is meticulously finished by the house’s artisans, whose standards of finishing are universally acknowledged. The surfaces of the pinions and wheels are perfectly flat and uniformly polished. All the screws and steel parts are hand-finished and polished. Kari himself describes these details as part of the “ethics” of watchmaking. For him, the movement architecture is “a reflection of respect for precision, longevity, robustness and watchmaking tradition.”

Guillochage: both aesthetic and functional

On the dial side, the Voutilainen Tourbillon 20th Anniversary naturally features a guilloché motif, just like its 1994 predecessor. The “Breguetian” inspiration is obvious, but beyond the purely aesthetic appeal of guillochage, which Breguet himself introduced to watchmaking, it’s important to consider the functional advantages of the process. A subtle engine-turned texture increases legibility and allows the use of much finer and more precise hands. The alternation of different guillochage patterns across the dial makes it possible to delimit different zones that are visually linked to particular indications.

Voutilainen Tourbillon 20th Anniversary wristwatch, 2024

The aesthetic effect remains paramount, offering subtle interplays of light and shade that animate the surface and bring the dial to life. The case, with its fluted sides, is also directly inspired by the 1994 pocket watch.

Tourbillon pocket watch, 1994

The ten-plus years Kari Voutilainen spent in restoration gave him a comprehensive understanding of classical watchmaking. His twenty years as an independent watchmaker have enabled him, on the basis of these solid foundations, to develop and deploy a creativity that, today, has restored aesthetic vitality to this time-honoured technique.

This will be even more fully explored in the “Centre of Excellence in the Art of Guillochage”, which is about to open its doors in Fleurier, just below the “Chapeau de Napoléon” where Voutilainen’s watchmaking workshops are located.

“Centre of Excellence in the Art of Guillochage”

In this centre, housed in the former Fleurier watchmaking school, which has been entirely restored and refurbished for the occasion, Kari Voutilainen is opening a showcase intended to house Brodbeck Guillochage.

Georges Brodbeck, who founded his company in 2004 – the same year the Voutilainen brand was created – owns a fabulous living and working collection of more than twenty old engine-turning machines, all of which he has restored and brought back to full working order. There are straight-line machines for linear decorations and broken lines, rose engine lathes for circular and concentric patterns and very rare machines known as “tapestry” machines, which could also be called “mechanical copying machines”. They are designed to replicate a given guillochage pattern, either by enlarging or reducing it, thanks to an articulated arm that “reads” the design from a metal plate known as a matrix or template. Georges Brodbeck has 1,500 matrices, all featuring a different design, which can be cut into conical, round and countless other shapes. As an example, tapestry machines like these are used to create the famous “Petite Tapisserie” dials of Audemars Piguet’s Royal Oak watches.

Georges Brodbeck

Awarded a Prix Gaïa in 2023, Georges Brodbeck is a living legend in watchmaking circles, considered one of the “saviours” of hand engine-turning. A precision machinist, he already had an illustrious career behind him, having been in charge of dial production with Rolf Schnyder (Ulysse Nardin) and Ernst Thomke (ETA, Ebauches SA). But then, in the early 90s, he was given an old, unusable engine-turning machine as a gift.

He restored it and went on to develop a passionate enthusiasm for these extraordinary machines, teaching himself to use them. From then on, he devoted himself fully to rose-engine lathes, travelling all over Europe in search of old machines that he would repair, modify and improve, both for his personal use and for some of the world’s most prestigious watch brands. He tips his hat to the late Nicolas Hayek who “after decades of neglect, revived guillochage when he took over Breguet.”

“It is an art,” he explains, “but you need a solid mechanical foundation to operate these machines. You have to know how to file and plane, how to work to a tolerance of a hundredth of a millimetre, how to adjust the machines, maintain them and equip them.”

Transmission of knowledge

When he reached retirement age, Georges Brodbeck was more determined than ever to pass on his knowledge and expertise. He could not for a moment countenance the idea that the art of engine-turning could be lost, and there was absolutely no question of his breaking up his collection of machines by selling them off one by one.

It was at this point that he connected with Kari Voutilainen. Kari was already looking to expand his own small fleet of engine-turning machines, when an article in the local newspaper caught his attention: the former Fleurier Watchmaking School, which in the 80s had been used for high school classes, was now lying empty and unused.

“I started to turn it over in my mind,” says the watchmaker. He came up with the idea of converting it into a centre of excellence dedicated to guillochage. He broached the subject with the town council, overcame many reservations, finally convinced them and received the green light. Georges Brodbeck, who was looking to pass on his machines and knowledge to a watchmaker, to a craftsman who shared the same passion and philosophy, was thrilled. Brodbeck Guillochage now has a permanent home in Fleurier.

Kari Voutilainen explains: “The idea is to be able to create exceptional pieces there. There are so many things to explore, so many shapes and variations, so many things to learn and create. The art of engine-turning has no limits. And beyond watchmaking itself, there are so many objects that can be enhanced with guillochage. We want to open our doors to all fields, globally, and offer creators the opportunity to imagine their own totally customisable guilloché motifs.”

Inside the premises there are dedicated areas for manufacturing, creation, research and, perhaps most importantly, teaching. Because without people to use them, these machines would end up in a museum.

Georges Brodbeck has already set about the task of teaching the art of engine-turning throughout Europe. He started to look for someone to take over from him, in the fullness of time, and found Ali Tastegöl who, for the past 20 months, has been learning how to restore old rose-engine lathes, as well as how to use them. Georges could not be happier with his protégé. After all, it takes a lot to do what he does: as well as a keen artistic sensibility and mechanical skills, it requires a steady hand and a mastery of tools, as well as the ability to sharpen burins and take accurate measurements (to the hundredth of a millimetre).

Sometimes, to create a complex decoration, three or four different machines are needed. On a surface like a dial, the slightest flaw, such as a line that is infinitesimally deeper than its neighbour, will be visible as the light falls across it. “Each motif is complex and each machine requires a specific sensitivity,” Georges Brodbeck explains. “In the end, engine-turners are artists.”

Inside the centre of excellence five guillocheurs are already in residence, independently making their own tools and adjusting their own machines. Kari Voutilainen also has plans to bring in other artistic crafts. There’s already a space set aside for enamelling and other disciplines such as marquetry could be added. “The idea is to be able to work on things that are truly complex and rare, combining guillochage with enamelling, engraving, etc.” Every watch part can potentially be decorated with guilloché motifs, including bridges and base plates, but also hands and indexes, like those Georges Brodbeck decorated with Clous de Paris.

At the recent Academy Awards, actor Cillian Murphy, winner of the Best Actor Award for Oppenheimer, wore the HS14 gold brooch by Sauvereign House (HK), a beautiful design inspired by Robert Oppenheimer’s work and crafted by Voutilainen.

This “atomic” brooch with its delicate guilloché waves is proof that the ancestral art of guillochage can reach out to the future to enhance our most precious objects with an unparalleled poetic touch. It is truly timeless.

The Finnish Museum of Horology and Jewellery Kruunu in Espoo, Finland, whose mission is to educate the public about the cultural heritage, history and meaning present within the watch and jewellery industries, is currently hosting “Voutilainen: Art of Time”. The exhibition showcases unique watches crafted by Kari Voutilainen, as well as sketches, photographs and videos related to his work.

Kari Voutilainen graduated from the Espoo Watchmaking School in 1986 and subsequently worked as a watchmaker and teacher in Finland before moving to Switzerland in the late 1980s.