Today IWS decided to tell you the history of one of the most fascinating maison of modern history: A. Lange & Söhne.
To do this, we need to dive back in time, when Saxony was going through a triving scentific and artistic era, thanks to the extreme fine tastes of its King, Augustus II the Strong.
This important legacy, dating back to ‘600, was alive up to the late ‘800, when Saxony gave birth to a generation of watchmakers able to write a new page in history.
Among these, we need to remind master Johann Christian Friedrich Gutkaes (born and dead in Dresden, 1785-1845) and his aprentice Ferdinand Adolph Lange (born in Dresden and dead in Glashütte, 1815-1875)
Since he was a kid, A. Lange shown a big interest in horology, so much that Gutkaes wanted him to be in his aprentices team, for a period even longer than planned.
Master Gutkaes, considered to be one of German horology’s founders and one of the most important figures to make it competitive to the Swiss’, saw something special in Adolph Lange. And how can we blame him, looking at the brilliant future of the man?
After studying in Dresden, Mr. Lange moved to Paris to work in Winnerl’s atelier, a famous master chronometer maker.
In 1845 Lange decided to follow his entrepreneur soul.
Due to the big crisis in the Ore Mountains, he decided to open a workshop in Glashütte to develop high-end mechanisms.
He named his new brand “A. Lange, Dresden” until 1868 when Richard, his first child, was born.
The name then changed to “A. Lange & Söhne”, a factory mainly oriented in pocket watches manufacturing.
Around the 1930s, A. Lange & Söhne began developing its first wrist watches
Right before World War II, Walter Lange was training in the family’s company, representing the fourth generation of Lange watchmakers. During this pre-war period, marine chronometers, aviation and army watches were the main production to offset the German Armed Forces requests.
The 8th of May, 1945, something as unexpected as cruel happened
The facility was entirely bombed by Russian army, just when the War seemed to be at its end. In 1948 the factory was expropriated by the communist regime.
The 7th of December 1990, after the Berlin wall fall and Germany’s reunification, Walter Lange decided to relaunch the brand under the name “Lange Uhren GmbH”, reaquiring soon after the rights on the original name “A. Lange & Söhne”. This rebirth was possible thanks to Günter Blümlein, a German entrepreneur that began moving into horology first at Junghans, then moving to IWC in 1980.
In 1994, exactly four years after its founding, was released to the market the model that symbolized the rebirth of the manufacture: the Lange 1.
In 2000 A.Lange & Söhne was acquired by luxury multinational company Richemont.
It was with the Lange 1 that immediately gained enthusiasts’ approval.
Right after, we’ve been presented masterpieces like the “Tourbillon Pour le Mèrite”, only-piece with a charging mechanism inherited by ancient marine chronometers. It was then time for the “Langematik”, automatic watch with a gold and platinum rotor, the “Datograph”, Lange’s ultimate chronograph, the “Langematik Perpetual”, ultra high-end perpetual calendar and last but definitely not least the “Double Split”, rattrapante chronograph.
In the following years, A.Lange & Söhne was capable to maintain the highest technical standards in its watches, constantly revolutionizing top models.
The Lange 1, for example, got more complicated by adding a second time zone indication. The perpetual charge mechanism was added to the “Tourbograph” that got the designation of “Pour le Mèrite” because of this complicated charge system.
Among new models from the company, we cannot forget to talk about the “Cabaret” collection and the “Zeitwerk”.
With the last one, A.Lange & Söhne became a main player in global horology, thanks to the fact that hours and minutes are not displayed through hands, but with two windows on the dial.
Another revolutionary model that goes off the grid, involving a mechanism used in theaters to point out plays’ beginning. The inspiration came from the 5-minutes digital clock built by Gutkaes for the Dresden “Semperoper” theater, even though some say that Walter Lange visited “Teatro alla Scala” in Milan, where we can find a digital clock too.
Talking about charme, remarkable aesthetics and finishing, A.Lange & Söhne is surely one of the most interesting maisons of our present.
It’s overwhelming to see how the brand has been able to blend history and aesthetic, bringing a very strong quality in finishing and complications.
Now that we told you the story we can just stop and stare at the bright future of A.Lange & Söhne, impatiently waiting for their next creations!
Translated by Lorenzo Spolaor (@itsdoc_oclock)
