Wyler Vetta: Swiss ingenuity, Italian creativity and over a century of innovation

The beauty of a brand not infrequently lies in its history, which does not necessarily have to be long. Sometimes, when things are done well and in the right way, a century or even less is ‘enough’. Proof of this is Wyler Vetta, which last year blew out its first 100 candles celebrating a century of innovation – a combination of Swiss mechanical genius and Italian entrepreneurship. A story full of successes, commercial exploits and models that have entered watchmaking history. A story worth telling.

WYLER VETTA AND THE INCAFLEX BALANCE WHEEL

The origins of Wyler Vetta lie between Biel, Switzerland, and Lake Maggiore, Italy. It was the year 1924 when the young watchmaker Paul Wyler, originally from the small Swiss town of Canton Bern, founded Wyler SA in Basel with his brother Alfred. The two brothers wasted no time and immediately proved to competing brands what they were capable of. In addition to their mastery of watchmaking technology, they were driven by an avant-garde entrepreneurial spirit and, above all, a desire to offer mechanical solutions that would make their watches accurate and reliable.

To achieve this, at the time it was imperative to ensure that the timepieces were as water-resistant as possible, and highly shock-resistant as well. Especially this last characteristic, which was the Achilles heel for most watches back then, became almost an obsession for Paul Wyler. He realised that, in order to achieve his goal, he would have to work on the most delicate part of the movement prone to breakage in the event of heavy shocks: the balance wheel.

The traditional balance wheel had in fact a classic construction characterised by short, straight arms that joined the outer part to the central pinion. Paul Wyler realised that the weakness of this important yet fragile component lay in the arms, as their design made them rigid and therefore easy to break if subjected to violent blows.

Wyler’s reasoning was simple: in order for those arms to withstand the stress of any shocks they suffered, he had to make them longer and more flexible and, therefore, stronger, possibly without increasing the size of the balance wheel so as not to have to redesign the calibre. He therefore had a very small space to work in. The intuition, as simple as it was ingenious, was the solution. The two arms became curved and, above all, characterised by an almost spiral shape capable of absorbing even the most violent blows. Thus was born, in 1927, the Incaflex balance wheel, which later became the standard inthe  watch industry.

Only three years had passed since the brand was founded, and Paul Wyler had already filed a patent that would change watchmaking history forever. And which, above all, would fulfil the mission he had given himself when founding his company: to design and create a robust watch that would withstand the shocks and stresses to which it would be subjected during everyday use.

A VOCATION FOR INNOVATION

That of the Incaflex balance wheel was only the first of a number of patents that, within a few years, made Paul Wyler’s company a benchmark for avant-garde mechanics. Let us recall, in chronological order, the patent for a rectangular ‘ratchet’ automatic watch (1931), the patent for a watch with a watertight case (1932) – subject of a second patent in 1936 and to further refinement in 1939.

Wyler devised several solutions for automatic winding, including a watch patented in 1931, which featured a double back that moved on a hinge. When the watch was worn, the double back moved alternately towards the back as a small pivot transmitted the displacement’s energy to the movement to wind it. In 1935, Wyler launched one of the first water-resistant rectangular watches, whose crystal was held in place by compressed elastic gaskets.

An unstoppable progression that had begun a few years earlier, in 1931, when Paul and Alfred Wyler joined forces with Swiss engineer Ernest Morf (who had worked on the Incaflex project) to create the Fabrique des montres Wyler SA in La Chaux-de-Fond. At the same time, the Swiss company’s path crossed that of a brilliant Italian watchmaker and watch dealer – a meeting with a man who changed the brand’s fortunes forever: Innocente Binda. 

MEETING WITH INNOCENT BINDA

After learning his craft in Luino, on the shores of Italy’s Lake Maggiore, in 1906 Innocente Binda opened a workshop in Besozzo, also on the lake, where he repaired and sold watches. In 1926 he moved to Milan, where he started his own business, sourcing both finished products and components from Switzerland. In 1932, Binda started selling the first wristwatches under the Wyler brand name, created in Bienne by Paul and Alfred Wyler. He added the name Vetta to the brand name, because the fascist regime prevented products with foreign names from being marketed in Italy.

Binda was among the first to understand the importance of marketing, and to use its principles effectively. In 1931, he demonstrated the endurance and effectiveness of the Wyler Vetta and Incaflex timepieces with a media stunt: he threw some watches equipped with that balance wheel from the top of the Eiffel Tower. Anotary standing at the base of the monument confirmed their functioning after the fall. An exploit that strengthened the brand’s reputation and was successfully repeated years later in Paris again (in 1956) and then in 1962, with a throw from the top of the Space Needle in Seattle to definitively conquer the American market, where the brand had been present for years, as an interesting historical anecdote shows.

In 1944, Albert Einstein – who had fled to the USA to escape Nazi persecution in Germany – fell into the park’s pond during a short boat trip in New York’s Central Park with a Wyler watch on his wrist. After getting out of the water, he checked that the timepiece still worked and later decided to write a letter to Wyler Corp. of New York, thanking them for producing a perfectly waterproof instrument. The letter is still preserved in the company’s archives.

The same archives hold numerous advertisements and posters dating back to the 1930s, 1940s and beyond, along with pictures of sporting celebrities who dedicated their victories to the brand. Indeed, Binda understood the importance of what we would call today ‘brand ambassadors‘, on whose wrists he placed Wyler Vetta watches. In those years, he chose them mainly in the sports world, whose champions were the most prominent personalities, often true idols such as the Inter Milan and national football team bomber Giuseppe Meazza or the cycling champion Alfredo Binda. It is no coincidence that the Italian football stars who won two consecutive World Championships (1934 and 1938) wore Wyler Vetta.

ALWAYS FORWARD-LOOKING 

After the Second World War, the role models changed, to some extent. In an Italy well on the way to post-war reconstruction and economic boom, the successful faces of the sports world were joined by those of film and show business who also began to wear Wyler Vetta. One example is Vittorio De Sica who, in 1948, filmed ‘Bicycle Thieves’ and picked up the Oscar for Best Foreign Film in 1950 with a Wyler Vetta on his wrist. Other famous names such as Marcello Mastroianni, Carlo Dapporto, Isa Miranda, Renzo Montagnani and Patrizia Mangano wore the brand’s watches both on the set and in their private lives.

It was a time when Wyler Vetta surfed on the strong growth of Swiss watchmaking around the world, further establishing itself in countries such as the United States, France, Italy and the East-Asian markets. It was also an era of creative fervour, during which the company created new models such as the Dynawind automatic watch in 1960, the Marquise dedicated to ladies (it had been launched for men in the 1930s) or the Stratowind world time in 1954. Like many other manufacturers of the time, in those years the company submitted its watches to the Bureaux de Contrôle Officiel de la Marche des Montres to obtain chronometer certifications, 43 of which were awarded in 1951 alone.

In addition to the technical developments on movements, Binda continued to push advertising campaigns and colourful posters of great impact for the time. For example, he devised a type of ‘dynamic billboard’ that was far ahead of its time. In the 1960s, a fleet of Alfa Romeo vans, customised with the Wyler Vetta logo and a three-dimensional reproduction of a clock on the side, travelled across Italy from north to south to deliver new collections to dealers.

WYLER VETTA BETWEEN PRESENT AND FUTURE

The strength of the brand grew further, so that by 1970 Wyler Vetta was distributed in 52 countries worldwide. In the 1970s, with the advent of quartz, the company joined forces with other Swiss manufacturers to create the Ditronic operating platform, the aim of which was to launch a quartz watch with a digital liquid crystal display. But the years of the so-called ‘quartz crisis‘ brought a difficult period, both for the company and for the entire Swiss watch industry. In 1991, a new company, Montres Wyler SA, was created in Geneva and two years later Simone and Marcello Binda, Innocente’s grandsons, acquired the brand. In 2021, Marcello Binda established Wyler Vetta Srl [Italian limited society, ed], took over as CEO and, with designer Fulvio Locci, presented a completely new collection, also renewing the distribution agreement. In 2024, the company welcomed Beppe Ambrosini as Partner and Senior Advisor, an authoritative figure in the market with a career spanning more than ten years with some of the most prestigious luxury watch brands.

The rest is recent history, with Wyler Vetta having, since its relaunch in 2021, repositioned the brand and refreshed the collections, in a portfolio that draws heavily from its past, but updated with state-of-the-art materials and movements. The Jumbostar, Dynawind and Heritage collections have evolved in both technical and design terms, and this year the Chronographe collection joined the range.

Building on the success of the celebratory Tribute to Ermetico model, in a limited edition of 100 and inspired by a famous watch from the 1940s, the newly launched Chronographe 38 is equipped with a hand-wound Sellita SW 510 BHM calibre with a 56-hour power reserve. Its aesthetic is inspired by one of the most iconic Wyler Vetta chronographs of the 1940s, one of the first in watchmaking history to boast a water-resistant case. In addition, the brand has also enriched the Jumbostar family with the new Jumbostar Incaflex, a limited edition of 100 watches equipped with the balance wheel invented by Paul and Alfred Wyler, integrated within the ETA 2894 manual calibre.

These recent launches well sum up the philosophy behind Wyler Vetta‘s new direction. Drawing inspiration from a history over a century long, and rich in innovation and entrepreneurial vision, to bring its most iconic products appropriately updated to a market that is today globalised and hard to please. A market that is not satisfied only with the product, but demands emotions, experiences, stories. The more the stories are true and authentic, the more a brand is destined for success. And on truth and authenticity, Wyler Vetta is a brand that has few rivals.

By Davide Passoni