"Playing Dragon and Phoenix" was made by Beijing Watch Factory for the luxury market. Provided to China Daily

 

Above: Watch movement designer Xu Yaonan is one of nine national "master watchmakers". Wang Kaihao / China Daily Right: The first tourbillon made by Xu Yaonan. Provided to China Daily

The nation's master watchmakers were late entrants in the luxury market and though they had high hopes of competing with the Swiss, the reality is more mixed. Wang Kaihao reports in Beijing.

The old Soviet-style Beijing Watch Factory was erected in Changping district more than 50 years ago. A giant statue of former chairman Mao Zedong stands at the front gate.

"It's almost the same as the day I first came here," says Xu Yaonan, 78, a watch movement designer who has worked at the factory since 1962, after graduating from Tianjin University. He majored in horologe machine manufacturing in the department of precision instruments.

"The watch manufacturing industry had just started in China at that time. We all wanted to make a contribution to the country."

China made its first watch, in 1955, in Tianjin. Watch factories mushroomed nationwide in the following years and Beijing Watch Factory was founded in 1958.

In June, China Horologe Association (CHA), the official organization supervising the development of the industry, presented the title of "Chinese Watch and Clock Masters" to 12 people nationwide for the first time in the Great Hall of the People. Xu is one of nine "master watchmakers".

As the son of a clock repairer in his hometown of Wuxi, Jiangsu province, Xu grew up with watch making gadgets, which made him decide to follow in his father's footsteps.

"Everyone in the factory was so disciplined and we had a very ambitious slogan: 'The watch won't leave the factory if it fails to catch up with (those made in) Switzerland."

Xu joined a delegation for a light industry exhibition in Poland, East Germany and Romania in 1964, and was proud to see Chinese watches appreciated by visitors for the first time.