An Inside Look At The New Glashütte Original Dial Manufacture

Here’s the headline: this summer, the namesake and flagbearer of the Glashütte watchmaking region, Glashütte Original, has opened its own, dedicated dial manufacture. You might be asking yourself, “I thought G.O. already did everything in-house, what’s the deal?” And while you would be right to ask, the basis of the question is also correct. Glashütte Original, while owned by Swatch Group, does, in fact, “do everything in-house,” or to be more specific: 95% of everything. However, up to this point, the dials for G.O. watches were made in a facility six hours away in Pforzheim. This move has brought production to a 5,000-plus-square-foot facility that is just a quick float down the babbling Muglitz River - 450 meters, to be exact.

In a market where collectors are placing increasing importance on “in-house” everything, this is a big move for a company that has been preaching the Homemade Gospel from the Saxon hilltops for decades. Not only does this allow for more agile production timelines, but it increases G.O.’s production capabilities as a whole. G.O. brought me to Germany to see the new facility and to tour the full manufacture as well. In addition to the photos here, which won’t tell the full story, we also have a full video touring the manufacture.

This sort of care for detail and attention to craftsmanship is deeply ingrained in the region, and in Glashütte Original as a brand. The people at this manufacture take the namesake very seriously. We were taken to the German Watch Museum (again, just around the corner, walking this time) and were shown the techniques for hand-silvering dials. Dial blanks are carefully treated and gently scored, then a mixture of secret and mysterious ratios (silver powder, salt, water) is prepared and applied by hand to make a silver-plated dial. This technique has been practiced for over one hundred years and is still being used in G.O.’s new facility, by only a few specially trained technicians.

This dedication to craft and specialty is evident all throughout the new dial manufacture. In the facility, I saw all of this traditional know-how scaled up and optimized for modern production needs: all of which you will also see here. Having seen all of this, I can tell you that the common thread in every stage of manufacturing was human touch — from the beginning of manually operated machine stamping, to the welding of dial feet, to the cutting of apertures and subdials, to the hand-sorting and inspection for galvanization, through hand-painting/coating, manually-operated dial printing, and hand-application of dial furniture. Effectively, every step of dial production involves a human eye or human hand.

This new facility, now in the heart of Glashütte, is allowing Glashütte Original to keep its in-house manufacturing close (in all ways), and is perpetuating the tradition and craftsmanship that make German watchmaking so singular. You can learn more at glashuette-original.com