Richard & Maria Habring visit
December 2006

by Tim Jackson G.G

On we travel down the path of independence. We had the pleasure of having Richard & Maria Habring with us for a few days, to introduce their watches and ideas to our clients and us. I first met them in Basel earlier this year outside the main watch hall, where we met up for a quick beer one of the afternoons between appointments. Coordinating with cell phones to meet was interesting, but we managed it. Having bid our farewells I left that brief meeting with a good sense of the Habrings and knew that these were people to look at working with in the future. I have to say that Dave Barnes was responsible for introducing me originally to their creations, having brought them in to the shop for my inspection. The first couple of watches were simple in function, clean quite traditional looking and very fairly (too cheaply!) priced for an independent producing so few watches. It was his Tourbillon that really got my attention though. I saw in this piece, many clients being able to afford a tourbillon from a master watchmaker of Richard’s caliber and history. An opportunity that I followed up on and culminated in ordering the first 2 pieces in September, quickly followed up by 3 more.

To give you a little background, Richard initially started down this path under the tutelage of the late Gunter Bluemlein at IWC. It was here in Schaffhausen that he honed his creative skills. The Deep One, a watch from IWC that sports a depth gauge was highly sort after and only made for a short period of time. Richard is the sort of guy a watch company would ask, “Can you make this?” He would then go and figure it out. Another of his major projects was designing and building the tourbillon that resides in the Il Destrio Scafusia, the extremely limited edition grand complication of which only 30 will be built. Probably his best known though is the split second mechanism he designed for the venerable Valjoux 7750 automatic chronograph movement that IWC uses as a base for their Dopple chronograph watch.
When Walter Lange approached Gunter Bluemlein and asked him if he wanted to play watches, A. Lange & Sohne was created again with Mr. Bluemlein at the creative helm. Richard followed him to Glashutte for 5 years. Living in Dresden he met Maria, a native of Dresden, and together stayed until Gunter Bluemlein’s untimely death in 2001.  It was while he was at Lange & Sohne that Richard continued to create some of the iconic watches that Lange is known for. Probably his masterpiece there from my perspective is his work creating the Lange 1 Tourbillon caliber. His knowledge and ability resulted in one of the most sublime tourbillons to come out of Glashutte. In keeping with the Lange tradition, he developed this caliber to be understated whilst being technically brilliant.

Richard and Maria’s next move was to be far reaching. They were contracted to go out to the far east and set up and run an A. Lange & Sohne distribution company, training the local watchmakers up to the standards expected with the idea of it being a 3 year commitment. However as is life, a family medical situation changed those plans initially, and then the distribution agreement of A. Lange & Sohne was withdrawn, so that put paid to their plans. At the pushing of his wife, you know what they say, behind every successful man is a brilliant woman, Richard was persuaded to begin Habring2, his collaboration with Maria, as an Independent watchmaker. They returned to his home region of Austria, Carinthia, specifically Völkermarkt, close to Klagenfurt where they set up shop to create micro mechanical marvels. As it is a business that requires careful planning and execution, they supplement the coffers with contract work for the big watch companies. As time goes on, this will lessen and they will concentrate more on their own production. This seems like a smart move from my perspective as many an entrepreneurial watchmaker has found trouble making financial headway alone without the support and structure offered by working for a big house.

The initial few watches to come from the Habring2 workshop were quite traditional being hand wound “Time Only” pieces using the Unitas 6498-1 as a base movt. Each year a collection of 12 pieces are made being numbered 01-12 200X. This watch has now evolved to become the “Carinthian” with the collaboration of a friend of the Habring’s, Florian Gullert, who other than being a watch enthusiast, is a highly skilled hand engraver in the high end rifle and shotgun business. This area of Austria has a long tradition of this engraving work and Florian is one of the highly sought after engravers. So Richard & Maria decided to see what Florian could do with a watch movement in terms of creating a traditional Carinthian engraved finish with which to use as a base for the Habring watches.

At the same time he created the new company logo, which is now found on all the movements emanating from their Völkermarkt workshop.
Other models are a manual winding jumping seconds which uses a 1960’s vintage Chezard 116 movement. This is quite a fun watch to wear in the store, as to the unsuspecting observer, it appears one is sporting, dare I say it, a quartz watch! As Dave was kind enough to lend me his watch for a few weeks, I have on several occasions tricked several of my good clients. I think this is an interesting watch and Habring2 has decided to incorporate this additional complication into next year’s basic automatic watch that will feature the new ebauche from ETA, the Valgranges.
This is big automatic workhorse of a movement derived from the venerable Valjoux 7750. Having the torque that was required to operate a chronograph, will allow this movement to power several complications. With the style of watchcases having grown in the past several years, this new movement will fill out those exhibition backs rather than requiring the use of a movement ring or a small porthole of an exhibition back. The current offering of the Automatic sports another vintage movement, the Felsa again from the 1960’s, one of the first self-winding movements other than the Rolex Perpetual caliber. The aforementioned new Automatic powered by the Valgranges will replace the current release.

Possibly the most exciting watch that Richard & Maria are creating currently is the Tourbillon. The example I have had the pleasure of handling and wearing again thanks to Dave, is superb technically. Aesthetically Spartan in the finishing, Richard has given the Unitas 6498 a Tourbillon makeover. He uses the parts of the original escapement and than constructs the cage by good old fashioned hand fabrication on lathes etc. Given the size of the cage, it provides one with a great visual of how a tourbillon works, so much so that be warned as it could be distracting to the wearer! These will in the future also come with the “Carinthian” style of finishing.

Onwards into 2007, we will see the introduction of the Habring2 Chronograph. This will sport a manual wind movement with the traditional 2 registers at 3 & 9 O’clock and the center sweep second hand for the chrono. Again found in the same 42mm case, a variety of dial options are going to be available.
I have pre-ordered 5 of these beauties based on the pictures. Our version will be with a glorious blue dial together with silver sub zones for the subsidiary seconds and the 45-minute counter. The movement is an older designed Valjoux 7733, which will be available with an exhibition back. The dial options are black, blue or copper with silver sub zones.

Richard and Maria have an interesting journey ahead of them. I’m in awe of these guys who decide to go it alone. It is a tough business when you look at it from a financial standpoint, the ability to balance this aspect with the creative side is a challenge that many a would be independent watchmaker realize is more than they can or are willing to take on. I’m willing to support this type of “stretching of oneself” as my dad likes to say. This is the arena in which creativity/artistry occurs and one I enjoy being a part of, especially at our end of the business, due the sheer enjoyment I see in many of our clients when owning and appreciating these great Independent watchmakers of our time. We are in a watch making renaissance, so great times ahead for us that love this field of micro mechanical art.

Warm regards,
Tim