Introducing HAUTLENCE – Cool logo, sophisticated watches!

There are “cool” watches.  There are “luxury” watches.  And then there are HAUTLENCE watches!  HAUTLENCE was created in 2004 on the initiative of Renaud de Retz, Guillaume Tetu, Jean Plazenet, Jean Christophe Chopin, and Alain de Forges.  The smooth and sophisticated sounding brand name is actually an anagagram of the famous watchmaking city of Neuchatel (by clever design, of course).

The founders decided that a strong sign was needed to symbolise the brand and what was to come from it – and so they decided on a mysterious object with one continuous surface that represents the mathematical sign of infinity – a Möbius band!  However they actually made it a very cool and very stylized form Möbius band – as shown above. With a logo such as this, I wonder how could they not make some impressive and forward-thinking watches?

Operating under what they call the “HAUTLENCE College” the brand presented its first official collection, the HAUTLENCE HL, in 2005.  HAUTLENCE describes the “College” as follows (or you can watch a really cool video about the College on YouTube by clicking here): 

“made up of leading experts and independent watchmakers from the Jura region near Neuchatel in Switzerland.  They are united by a single-minded passion for exclusive and innovative timepieces.  Their ambition is to create a collegial work whose outstanding features are savoir-faire, a meaningful ethic and an audacious approach, toegether with a desire to impart to others their own love of superb watchmaking workmanship, which enjoys a new lease of life in their modern creations.” 

Although this seems like a long way of saying – “we make really cool, exclusive and sophisticated luxury watches” – their ethos seems to work!  Since 2005, the brand has continued to innovate and bring new collections to market, includng the HL(S) and most recently, the HL(Q) collections.  You can see them all in this great video from our friends at TheTimeTV:

Here’s a pic of the HAUTLENCE HL06 in Grey Gold (the 43.5mm x 37mm case design reminds me of a flat screen TV)

Want one?  Be warned – the privilege of showing off one of these beauties on your wrist will set you back about $35,000 US!  Want one or not, expect more exciting watches to come from this young brand.