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Lange and Sohne, a little history

Magnificent and bold are just a few of the superlatives which come to mind when watch lovers describe A. Lange & Sohne timepieces.

Ferdinand Adolf Lange was born on February 18, 1815 in Dresden. This was the capitol of the Kingdom of Saxony which was just admitted to the German Confederation that same year. The son of a gunsmith, Lange studied watchmaking under Johann Christian Friedrich Gutkäs, the Saxon royal watchmaker. After his apprenticeship, Lange went to work for Joseph Thaddäus Winnerl, himself a student of Abraham-Louis Breguet.

After three years working in Paris, Lange returned to Dresden and married Gutkäs’ daughter, partnering with his former teacher as Lange & Gutkäs. Lange’s experience had shown him the potential of a system of etablissage, with specialized workers producing various components on a large scale. He applied for funding from the state government to begin a watchmaking apprenticeship program and was granted a large loan of 6,700 Thalers.

The government wanted to establish a watchmaking industry similar to that in the Swiss Jura to provide employment in the remote mountain towns of Saxony. This region was already known as “Saxon Switzerland” due to its similarity to the Jura, and had seen an influx of ethnic German farmers over the previous 100 years. The tiny valley town of Glashütte was selected for Lange’s workshop.

F. A. Lange’s Glashütte workshop is the current home of the brand, Nomos Glashütte

Lange established an apprenticeship program for his students in the attic of a large house in town. 15 former straw weavers became watchmakers, paying for their training with a loan against the Saxony state funds. Once they were fully trained and had paid off their debt, these watchmakers would establish their own independent workshops, turning out whichever component they were best at producing. In this way, Lange seeded the watchmakers of Glashütte just as Daniel JeanRichard had in Le Locle a century earlier.

Lange was a champion of quality, standardizing on the Metric system and Antoine LeCoultre’s Millionomètre. He also implemented a so-called “3/4 plate” and this would become a symbol for Glashütte watchmaking. Although harder to construct, the use of a large plate instead of individual bridges stabilized the wheel train and improved the reliability of Lange’s watches.

The products of F. A. Lange & Cie. quickly gained international recognition. They earned a medal at the London Industrial Exhibition in 1868 tanks to Lange’s innovative “Glashütte anchor” design. Soon, Lange was exporting components to the United States as well, providing much-needed income in Glashütte but designated there as coming from the better-known city of Dresden.

Friedrich Emil Lange

In 1868, F. A. Lange was joined by his son Richard, and the company was renamed A. Lange & Söhne. As the father turned more to politics and civics (he was mayor of Glashütte from 1848 to 1866 and a member of the Saxon state parliament after this) the son took over management and development. Friedrich Emil Lange also joined the firm, shortly before his father died unexpectedly on December 3, 1875.

Richard Lange was a gifted watchmaker as well, and contributed many inventions to the firm. Among these was dead-beat seconds, a power reserve indicator (marked “Ab” and “Auf” as on modern watches from the company), Rattrapante chronograph, and even an automatic winding mechanism. But Richard Lange was forced to withdraw from the company in 1887 for health reasons, leaving his brother Emil to run it. Richard continued to develop new watch technologies and would become chairman of the German Watchmaking school in 1891.

Today, A. Lange and Sohne is widely considered to be one of the finest watchmakers in the world. Its timepieces are prized by collectors and connoisseurs for their beauty, precision, and engineering excellence. The brand’s history is rich with tradition, and its watches are the embodiment of German craftsmanship and engineering at its finest.

Year S/N

1870 3,500

1875 10,000

1880 15,000

Year S/N

1885 20,000

1890 30,000

1895 35,000

Year S/N

1900 40,000

1905 50,000

1910 60,000

Year S/N

1915 70,000

1920 75,000

1925 80,000

Year S/N

1930 85,000

1935 90,000

1940 100,000

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