Glashütte Original

The small town of Glashütte is the centre of the art of German watch making. Here the specialists of the country were assembled, enabling the individual companies to create the most technical and sophisticated watches. The large Glashütte watchmaker tradition began in 1845 with the founding of the first watch manufacturer Ferdinand Adolph Lange - the founding father of the A. Lange & Söhne brand. In 1852 Julius Assmann also decided on the Glashütte location - he began with the manufacturing of pocket watches. The concentration of know how at one place encouraged innovation: In 1863 the first stop watch was presented at the Glashütte, the first ladies watch followed in 1874. But the Glashütter watchmakers wanted more: they founded under the leadership of Moritz Gorssman, the first German School of Watch Making. This also caused a further boom in this Saxon town: In 1893 the Union Taschenuhrfabrik was founded by Johannes Dürrstein, which was changed into the Glashütter Präzisionsuhrenfabrik AG in 1904 by Ernst Kasiske. The in 1927 founded Uhren-Rohwerke-Fabrik Glashütte AG (UROFA) completed the offer made by the town. Competitors but also colleagues; being conscious that the joining together at the Glashütte means more strength for each and every enterprise. No wonder that in 1951 the resident manufacturers joined together as the VEB Glashütter Uhrenbetriebe (watch manufactures), to advertise and produce their watches as a whole. As Saxony was part of the DDR, the business was state controlled until 1990, after the fall of the DDR this conglomerate of companies was changed into a GmbH, this was privatised in 1994, the new company then traded under the name of Glashütte Original. The enterprise is still independent today.

Under the name of Glashütte Original the following models are some of the most sought after collector's items: Julius Assmann, Senator ewiger Kalender, PanoMatic, PanoRetrograph, PanoGraph, Alfred Helwig 1, Karree Panoramadatum, Sport Automatik Evolution.