The famous Swiss watchmaker Girard-Perregaux has been making watches for more than two centuries now. Jean-François Bautte, a famous watch maker and goldsmith was the founder of this firm. Currently, its operation is based from La Chaux-de-Fonds, Switzerland and is an integral part of the Sowind group. Ever since its very beginning days, the watchmaker has been operational in all aspects of watch making from its engineering angle to the very last polishing phase. In the year 1852, Constant Girard created the Girard & Cie Firm in La Chaux-de-Fonds. Later, he went on to marry Marie Perregaux and thus arrived the Girard-Perregaux firm. Half a century later, Constant Girard-Gallet, who assumed the control of the firm from his father, purchased the Bautte House and combined it with Girard-Perregaux.

Some of the best wrist watches ever made in the world arrived from the stable of this famous watch maker. The firm was responsible for crafting the very first large scale manufacture of wristwatches done for the German Navy under the order of Kaiser. Its officers worn 2000 watches created exclusively for them. In the year 1965, Girard-Perregaux created the very first mechanical watch movement with high frequency, where the balancer goes at the rate of 36,000 vibrations every hour.

Again, the same firm was responsible for creating the very first quartz based wristwatches in the world in the year 1970. A year later they came out with a revised model with the ability to vibrate at 32,768 hertz, and the world has accepted this as the standard for quartz watches even to this day.

The hands on approach employed by the firm helped it to become experts in creating watch movements, cases, bands etc. They use the services of a variety of people like watchmakers, engineers, movement designers, watch polishers etc. among many other talented workers to come up with their watches. Thus, Girard Perregaux has the ability come up with high quality luxury watches from its basic components all the way up to its completion.

Not many watchmakers has the ability to create their own watch movements. The Girard Perregaux has the rare honor that it designs and develops all its movements. They have an assortment of luxury watch making movements in its stable. Of course, the most popular one among them is the Tourbillon with three gold bridges.

In fact, to this day, this model is considered as the true representative of the brand. It was originally created in the year 1884 and patents were filed for. Later, the original design was modified to improve its features significantly. Rather than being a technical sophistication of the watch, this feature became an integral part of its design aesthetics. Right now, you can purchase the Tourbillion with three gold bridges in various versions. In fact, many other watchmakers have incorporated this feature in to their watches.

One of the most prominent luxury watches from the brand name is the vintage 1945 model with a rectangular case. One of its most amazing features is the presence of all the 24 time zones in the world on its dial.