The Swiss watchmaking industry is concentrated in western Switzerland, in the arc formed by the Jura mountains which stretch from Geneva in the south to Basel in the north, an area which the tourism authorities have named Watch Valley.

Geneva

Clock and watchmaking first appeared in Geneva in the middle of the 16th century. In 1541, reforms implemented by Jean Calvin which a ban on wearing jewels, forced the goldsmiths and other jewellers to turn into a new, independent craft : watchmaking.

Furthermore, Calvin himself was a stickler for timekeeping, and in 1541 issued an edict imposing fines on anyone who turned up late for church - or left early. In 1561 clocks were installed at a number of stratetic points in the city, so that no-one should have an excuse for not being punctual.

By the end of the century, Genevan watches were already reputed for their high quality, and watchmakers created in 1601 the Watchmakers' Guild of Geneva.

Watchmaking there received a further boost in 1685, when Louis XIV of France revoked the Edict of Nantes, thereby severely restricting the freedoms of French Protestants. Thousands of them left the country, and many settled in the nearby Protestant stronghold of Geneva, bringing their skills with them, including watch and clock making - a craft which was just entering a new stage of development.

Among the watchmaking families of Geneva were the great-grandfather, grandfather and father of the enlightenment philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau, who were descended from French Protestant refugees.

Homeworking in the Vallée de Joux

From Geneva watchmaking spread north and east. The first watchmaking workshop was established in the Vallée de Joux in 1740. This area, situated at about 1000 meters (3,300 ft) above sea level, was largely cut off from the rest of the world in the winter time, and watchmaking provided a source of income to farmers when there was little or nothing to do in the fields.

In the days before industrialisation, homeworking was a well-established practice. Textiles in particular were manufactured in this way. Agents would bring raw materials to workers in their own homes, and collect the finished products. It was just the same with watchmaking, and since the raw materials and finished product were of small size, easily transportable and highly profitable, it quickly replaced lacemaking, the previous mainstay of the long winters.

Machine tools

Not only watchmaking, but a number of machine-tool factories for the industry provided work in Watch Valley - and still do.

As is typical of the Swiss engineering industry, some of these factories are world leaders in the production of niche products. Vallorbe prides itself on being the world capital of precision files; Moutier for cam-controlled automatic screw-cutting lathes with adjustable headstocks, which revolutionised watch making in the 1880s.

A watch contains a large number of parts, which also have to be manufactured. The Ajoie area around Porrentruy, towards the northern end of the watch making area, specialised in making the jewels which act as ball-bearings. This very complex process was spread over a number of different specialised workshops, culminating in the drilling.

With few exceptions, this remained in the hands of small homeworkers until the advent of laser drilling in the 1970s, which put an end to the industry. Porrentruy also made watch cases and faces.