The “World-Time” History

"Heure Universelle" an essential complication of the watch world that is revered by many collectors. Using the translation from French, we arrive “World Time” in English. The endeavor began when the world began the rapid development in new means of transportation. It came down to the realization of Chief Engineer of the Canadian Railway, Sandford Fleming. He often found himself having to adjust his watch to the local standard time whenever he would arrive at a new location, this cased him great distress and he would often miss his ride. This inspired him to propose a standard global time by dividing the world into 24 time zones. The system was adopted in 1884 at an international conference in Washington.

The one who changed the world of watches, Louis Vincent Cottier began his life in 1894 and passed in 1966 at the age of 71.  He had watchmaker blood running through him, his father Emmanuel Cottier was well versed in the arts of watchmaking and an enthusiasm to invent and create. Born, raised and lived in Carouge, Switzerland his entire life. He began his watch making journey in École d’Horlogerie in Rue Necker, Genève (Geneva’s Municipal watch making school) and his teacher which played an import roll was Henri Hess. When he completed his training went and worked for Jaeger until 1931. The great Depression hit and the stock market crash in 1929 this caused Louis to lose his job. Subsequently lead to him creating his workshop which was in the back of the stationery shop he ran with his wife.   

Louis Cottier

His creations included desk clocks, pocket watches and wristwatches. With his skills honed and creative juices flowing, taking inspiration from his father’s earlier version of the World Time mechanism. In fact, his first world time invention was in the form of a pocket watch dedicated to the French jeweler, Baszanger. Big players began to take notice of his ingeniousness; thus, he began working with the only the most prestigious brands Agassiz now known as Longines, Patek Philippe, Vacheron Constantin and Rolex.

In 1931 Louis had applied for a few different patents but among them Swiss patent no. 270085, no. 273141 and no. 285376. Patents played a very important role back in the day, not only did they safeguard inventions from being stolen but help document them. It acted as a schematic and shows the progress and operation of which the inventions are used.

How did the world time work? Cottier’s design was legible as it showed the current local time in the center dial with the classic 3 hand’s layout. This displays real time in cities distributed over our planet’s 24 time zones. City names circled the periphery of the dial above an inner 24-hour ring that turns counterclockwise. The ring’s movement simultaneously coordinates the times in all time zones, meanwhile the hands indicate the time in the place whose name is displayed at 12 o’clock, which is considered local time. The design allowed time in all 24 time zones to be displayed at once, using a single set of hands and a rotating inner bezel. 

Original drawing, signed Louis Cottier, 1930: “Universal watch without hands (with centre seconds)”. “The names of the cities are fixed, the numbers turn.” ©Ville de Genève, Archives du Musée d’art et d’histoire

The fable is yet to conclude for Louis Cotter, as he was relentless with his ideas and innovation. To strive for further improvement with each of his hundreds of movements he has created. In 1953 he would again show the world his genius, with his pervious design; the method of adjustment of 24-hour ring was to use the local time, with one crown. This would prove to inconvenient and cumbersome. To solve this, he added a second crown that controlled the 24-hr ring independently. The first Patek reference to feature this two-crown movement is a world time wristwatch that is near and dear to hearts of collectors “Worldwide” the ref. 2523.

Till this day his inventions and creations have rippled across time and proves that its design holds the foundation of World time complication. Here are some significant dates and achievements to remember 1931: “Heures Universelles”, 1932: “Jumping hour” patent, 1934: “Heures Universelles” writstwatches. 1950: Two-crowns “Heures Universelles”, 1954: “Two-dials with one movement”, 1958: “Linear Hour display, “1959: Two Time Zone patent. We begin to realize with challenges, problems and question we are given the opportunity to overcome, solve and answer with flourishing ideas and innovation.  Of course, it needs to be done with beautiful aesthetics and class.

Let’s dive in deeper in some examples of Louis Cotters designs put to use by Patek Philippe and compare the two. First, we have the “World time” / "Heures Universelles" with the ref 1415  introduced in 1939 and continued its production approximately 1954. The movement of the watch has two variations first is a 12’’’ ligne pocket watch movement with wolf tooth winding, gold wheel train and camwheel regulation. In the later productions the 1415 received an upgrade in the movement and were fitted with the caliber 12’’’120 movement. Enhanced with Louis Cotters world time mechanism. The bezel indicates just 30 world cities, while later generation examples display 39 or 41 cities. All examples were produced in a 31mm case with tear-drop lugs.

Patek Philippe Ref. 1415 "World Time"

Secondly, we have a Calatrava “Travel time” with the ref 2597 dubbed "Heures Sautantes" Starting its production in 1958 until 1977. The watch came to play after the Louis Cottier 1953 prototype with jumping hours with Patek patented it in 1959. The Swiss Patent 340191 for a "Time Zone Watch". Housed with Louis Cotter modified caliber 12 400 HS In the beginning the watch had two hands, the jumping occurred when you wanted to independently adjust the hour hand. The pushers on the left-hand side of the case were there to advance or set back the hour hand in one-hour increments. The second generation of the watch launched in 1962 introduced a third hand for the purpose of showing your “home” time. In a larger case size coming in at 35.5mm.

Patek Philippe Ref. 2597 Calatrava "Travel Time"

“The man whose interests go beyond the horizon” we now understand the impact, the history and how the complication evolved and taken new characteristics. With the branches in which the expression of world time; we have a key important purpose with aesthetics that caters to the collector. Beautiful complexion, simple classics and jaw shattering amazingness.