How to make cloisonné enamel dials

[Alberto]

Below you will find a few pictures detailing the steps used to make the dials for the "Les Paradisiers" limited edition watches.



Cloisonné Enamel is a true artform, involving a very high degree of skill and dexterity. Once the dial is engraved (if necessary, to provide a design under the translucent enamel background - see the Venice series for exemples), the design is drawn on the dial. A very thin gold wire is then very carefully bent to match the outline of the design with tweezers (and a LOT of patience and skill), and is then glued onto the dial.



Each bend has to be made at exactly the right angle, since the wire is one continuous piece for each boundary (or part of the design), and as such it must remain perfectly parallel to the dial surface. You can imagine how bending it at just a slighly wrong angle would make it raise from the dial and therefore no longer be able to contain the enamel as it melts!



Indeed, that is the next step of the process. Very finely ground enamel is carefully placed inside of each boundary made by the gold wire (think of color by numbers ), and the dial is oven-fired to melt the enamel. This process is repeated until enough thickness of enamel builds up to give the appropriate color and depth to the design.



As the last step, the whole dial is ground flat (so that the gold wire and all the various enamel zones are all of the same height) and then polished to a nice shine.



I leave it up to you to imagine just how many things can go wrong along the way before a cloisonné enamel dial is good enough to be fitted on a Patek Philippe watch!!!

[Jack Forster]

. . . just incredible, thank you Alberto! The labor intensive nature of cloisonné has seldom been so clear.

Jack

[hkling]

I am an admirer of the enemal dials. Can't find many good ones nowadays.

Regards
Ling

[happy_wis]

Wow... speechless...

Alberto, thanks a lot for giving us such detail description.

[aptronym]

Wow...Thank you so much for this. I can't think of a better way to describe this art from than through your photos, they are amazing!

[Alberto]

...and were part of their press kit on the enamel watch series. So I am afraid I do not know with certainty whose hands they are.

This said, there is a clue in the photo which gives it away!

Care to look for yourselves and see if you cand find it? If not, then scroll down, and you will find the answer...

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Ok, here you are:

Given the JD Paillonnée dial which is visible out of focus in the lower part of the picture, the hands can only belong to Anita Porchet, one of the most skillful enamellers currently alive, and - unfortunately - one of the last ones as well!

If you wish to find out more about her, there's an excellent article on her and her work here : http://general.watchprosite.com/show...ost/ti-344167/

[hkling]

I agree Anita Porchet is one of the best. It is good that she does not attach to one particular brand. We can therefore see her fine work in wider spectrum. If one can afford and is interested, her artistic work is a must to own and keep.

Regards
Ling

[pj.m]

Thanks Alberto, very interesting indeed. The dials are beautiful to begin with, but once you understand the time and skill required, they are all the more precious.
I didn't know that the dials were fired numerous times to achieve the full thickness of the gold wire. You have to be very patient to work like that. I'd love to try it once.

Phil