Every year during the Salon International De La Haute Horlogerie (SIHH) in Geneva awards are giving the best young watchmakers. A.Lange & Söhne developed the Walter Lange Watchmaking Excellence Award that had 8 young watchmakers from around the world competing to design and build an acoustic indication on a base watch movement. Students were given 6 months to complete the task. This year’s winner was Otto Peltola from Finland at the watchmaking school of Espoo, who built a movement that sounds on the quarter hours with different tones with a unique striking mechanism that reflects his families history of musicians. Two other students were given special recognition for their work.

This years winner of the F.P. Journe Young Talent Competition supported by the Fondation de la Haute Horologerie was Tyler John Davies, a graduate from the School of Jewellery at Birmingham University for his “eight-day, weight-driven wall clock with a deadbeat escapement that sits in an American black walnut case”.  Mr. Davies built most of the clock by hand such as engraving the dial with a gravograph and riveting the dial feet in place. “I included some of my own principles: the mechanism should be open and easily viewed… I aim to make 90% of the components from raw material with use of both traditional and modern manufacturing techniques where suited [with a] traditional construction.”