WITH LABOR BELIEVE THAT THE ALREADY BEGINNED DECEMBER. CLUBS OF BLUE CLOUDS, PERIODICALLY SPRINGING RAIN, BRIGHT-GREEN LAWNS AND MAPLES DROPPED WITH YELLOW LEAVES, UNFOLT. AMONG CAREFULLY CUTTED TUIS, SUNSHINE FLOWERS ARE ALSO BROWNED ON STILL FLOWERING IN THE PANEL EYES. BUT STILL…
Here it is December! Decorated with wooden log cabins of Christmas fair houses lined up along the famous Champs Elysees and offering passers-by a variety of festive goods: from souvenirs, cheeses, sausages, gingerbread, sweets and hot mulled wine spilled directly from barrels, to Russian "nesting dolls", amber beads and hats earflaps. Where without them! In December, in the capital of France ....
The thin spire of the Eiffel Tower, piercing a lead-gray rain cloud hanging over a snowless city, recalls - we are in Paris! He is echoed by a proud Egyptian stele in Concord Square. Chestnuts crackle merrily in the braziers all over the place, the aroma of which adds to the holiday mood.
When dusk falls on the city, the bright illumination of numerous shop windows and city streets, the colorful balls of Christmas trees and the cries of the sellers of Village de Noel, discharged in Santa Claus, make you forget about such an annoying misunderstanding as the complete lack of snow. Gusts of evening wind from the Seine leave no choice for citizens and numerous guests of the French capital - everyone wraps themselves in scarves and rushes under the hospitable roofs of numerous street cafes. Just three weeks before Christmas. And everyone hopes that on a festive night the thermometer’s column will finally drop from + 8 ° С to the “snow-forming” minus, bringing with it not only fresh wind from the banks of the Seine, but also a magical sparkling snow in the light of lanterns from millions of snowflakes.
And at that time ...
If you discard the holiday lyrics (although you can’t do without it), it must be said that the “window to Paris” was opened for a group of Middle Eastern journalists by the French-Swiss watch company Bell & Ross. The fact is that this watch brand appeared not so long ago, unlike the Swiss large and small watch manufactories, but so loudly and distinctly declared itself that it soon gained respect even among the recognized luminaries of this old industry. I don’t know who came up with the brilliant idea of organizing the first press tour in the “Holy of Holies” - to the head office and the production center of Bell & Ross (which we still had to find out), but the news of the advent of Christmas to the homeland of the watch brand ( moreover, from the beginning I was sincerely convinced that we were flying to Switzerland), I was pleased and given the anticipation of this holiday, associated with new meetings and discoveries.
In the early morning, a beautiful new Etihad Airways airliner takes us from the UAE capital to Paris, where the fate and future of the European Union are decided on the same day in the Champs Elysees: French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel make adjustments to the charter of this powerful but pretty battered crisis of the organization of developed European economies, which Standard & Poor's constantly threatens to lower credit ratings ... How did we, Etihad Airways passengers, know about this. Yes, of course, not far off is the new “tightening of belts” in all the largest countries of Europe and not only budget adjustments and other government measures aimed at curbing a new wave of financial crisis, but we have a completely different goal.
Of course, we fly to the same place where the Champs Elysees is located, but in order to see, understand, appreciate and tell about interesting watches that occupy our own niche, which are born within the walls of the Bell & Ross company. I hope that they will be born even if a new crisis covers .... Although (permit, I will allow myself another lyrical digression), judging by the number of paper bags with logos of leading fashion brands in the hands of Parisians always rushing somewhere, the latter also do not really think about the ratings and world of stock exchanges, lowering or raising indices countries.
They simply, like all other inhabitants of the planet, continue to enjoy life, and all their thoughts are busy preparing for the most favorite holidays of the end of the year and buying gifts in boutiques Dior, Chanel, Tara Jarmon, Boucheron, Cartier, Hermes, Louis Vuitton and others like them . By the way, every successful purchase is marked by Parisians with a good dinner with a glass of wine in their favorite cafe with a girlfriend ... Despite the height of the working week, all city cafes are simply crowded in the daytime. Well, lunch is an untouchable time. And no, even the most urgent work in the world, will not force the inhabitants of the French capital to abandon an hour or two spent outside the office walls. Therefore, we will leave Parisians and Parisians alone with each other and their affairs, and we will go to the ... museum.
I'll take you to the museum
In order to feel the connection between the past and the present, and to clearly understand what the philosophy of Bell & Ross is built on, we went to the Paris des Invalides House of Veterans and Disabled. Yes Yes!
This massive building, crowned by a dome resembling St. Isaac's Cathedral in St. Petersburg, and consisting of a whole complex of covered galleries and courtyards, was built by decree of King Louis XV. Then the monarch ordered to place a hospital in the buildings of the building for soldiers and officers who were injured and injured in the many wars waged by France. Today, most of the complex is occupied by the military museum - Musee de Armee, however, its second half is still an operating hospital for war veterans and invalids, although now it is already modern, and there are also barracks for military units serving their service. They say that even the Russian Emperor Peter I visited here at one time and was satisfied, having examined all the premises intended for the healing of the defenders of France.
Today's exposition of the museum is extensive and slightly reminiscent of the Armory of the Moscow Kremlin, especially in the part where medieval knightly armor and various weapons are represented - from bows and crossbows, to swords, swords and, finally, a firearm arsenal. Naturally, it is not possible to go around the entire museum in a few hours, but we did not have a similar task. We went to where it was about the First and Second World Wars and the dawn of aircraft construction.
A lively guide began to talk about the first planes and how people always wanted to fly into the sky. And here, attention is the question! What for? It turned out that the connection with the main purpose of our visit was obvious - Bell & Ross took the theme of pilots as the basis of their first works, since the first watches in the world appeared precisely thanks to representatives of this courageous profession.
Prior to aviators, all normal people used pocket watches-onions and proudly wore them, attached by chains to vest pockets of expensive suits. It was beautiful and status. But! Pilots needed to see the exact time without taking their hands off the helm. What kind of pocket watch is it? So the strap was invented, which allowed the watch to be mounted on the wrist. And it was a revolution! Of course, it was started not within the walls of Bell & Ross, but much earlier, but this circumstance prompted two friends - Bruno Belamis and Carlos Antonio Rosillo - to found their own watch company.
Why, one asks? Is there really not enough hours without them? "Then, that we want to reach the stars, go down to the depths of the ocean to explore them; then, that we are obsessed with our passion and understand how a person always strove to oppose himself to time and turn a few seconds into the moment of eternity." So decided Bruno and Carlos. And they started to work.
25 Rue Royal. Le village royal
After leaving the museum, we went to the very center of Madeleine, where boutiques of the most famous French brands are located on the territory of Village Royal. It was here that after opening seven branded stores in Asia and the Middle East, including Dubai in the BurJuman shopping center, Bell & Ross opened its first flagship boutique in the French capital. “France is a very dynamic market with picky and demanding customers. This expected opening of a company store in Paris allows us today to offer our customers and collectors a wider selection of watches in an environment that fully reflects the aesthetic principles of our brand, as well as provide them with personalized services” “, said Carlos Rosillo, president and co-owner of Bell & Ross.
You can’t argue with such a statement, but a new boutique with glossy tinted black windows and wooden panels, furnished with comfortable leather armchairs, small display cases and low tables, at which it is so convenient to consider the best samples from the main Bell & Ross collections: Aviation, Marine, Vintage and unique turbillons from the BR01 line, simply echoes the basic principles of this watch brand, where everything is based on clean lines and timeless elegance.
Here we spent some time with pleasure, looking at the latest watches and listening to the explanations of a pretty girl-seller, periodically casting glances at the Parisians looking into the Bell & Ross window-case from the street. It looked funny because it was light outside, and we saw them, but they didn’t. I hope that each of those who looked into these windows that day nevertheless looked out for a watch suitable for himself or for a present.
Copernicus Street 8. 16th quarter, Paris
Not for idle interest, we came to this old house, built on Copernicus Street (8 rue Copernic) in 1888. After thirteen years of tireless work in a building on Sainte Honore, Bell & Ross relocated its headquarters to this historic mansion. It is noteworthy that once this house was built by a talented Ecuadorian liberal and democrat, journalist and author of numerous essays, Juan Montavlo, known throughout Europe and the United States for his sharp views on any kind of dictatorship. Here he lived and worked, not knowing that someday this house would pass into the hands of no less gifted people.
Today, in this four-story building on an area of more than 1000 square meters. meters, all the main divisions of the company are located, including the offices of Bell & Ross President Carlos Rosillo and art director Bruno Belamis: creative studio, public relations and communications department, sales and logistics department, watch workshops, accounting, legal and administrative departments.
A giant twisted marble staircase leads the visitor to where he needs to get from the spacious black and white lounge on the ground floor. It is worth remembering, however, that the building is old, which means the floors (read, ceilings) are high. For the greater convenience of employees and guests, a glass elevator was built in the stairwell aperture, capable of accommodating only three people at a time and moving at the speed of a turtle. Is it because all the girls working at headquarters are so “thin and voiced” that they have to move day and day along the spiral staircase on official business?
On the ground floor there is an exhibition hall where all the lines of Bell & Ross watches are presented, and the walls above the windows are hung with black and white photographs of the first aviators, airplanes of different years and even astronauts (maybe it seemed to me, but I clearly guessed in one of the faces USSR pilot-cosmonaut Andriyan Nikolaev). We were told in secret that the company did not know exactly who was captured in the old pictures, since the entire collection was collected in numerous Paris flea markets .... For the entourage. I must say, this idea was a success, and today Bell & Ross can be proud of the collected collection of photographs. It may happen that someday they will become a museum rarity. In the meantime, continue the conversation about the present.
Four ranges of Bell & Ross
The presentation of the company, held by its cheerful President Carlos Rosillo, shed even more light on the basic principles of brand development. Today, Bell & Ross, which began developing watches in the military style in 1992, the first collection of which was released in 1994, is one of the leaders in this niche. Probably, the company was helped in some way by the fact that in 1997 part of its shares was acquired by Chanel House, who believed in the prospects of the ideas of Carlos and Bruno.
The basic principles of Bell & Ross and those watches that come out of its workshops were formulated very clearly: reliability, functionality, accuracy and intelligibility. That is all. It is no coincidence that today Bell & Ross, whose Chatelain manufactures are located in Switzerland, in the famous La Chaux-de-Fonds Watch Valley, is the official supplier of such military branches in France as Space Lab Mission aerospace units, Submarines submarines, RAID, Anti anti-terrorist units -mine Military Squads, Air Force pilots (Air Force) and Elite Police Elite Police.
The watches of all four Bell & Ross main lines have a recognizable appearance, since the devices from the dashboards of aircraft and ships of the 1940-50s were taken as the basis. The VINTAGE collection is a tribute to the skill and courage of the first aviators, at first glance it can discern the features of the very first watch movements: a round laconic case, a classic dial design, deliberately worn leather straps. Today it presents two main collections of PW1 - pocket and Vintage WW1 - watches.
Devoting his work to modern pilots, Bell & Ross designers created the BR01 INSTRUMENT collection, which accurately reflects the functionality and reliability of the dashboard of civilian and military aircraft. Watches in this line, without changing their shapes, are made of a variety of materials and their combinations - steel, titanium, carbon fiber, gold. And the color scheme of the dial design changes annually and varies from completely black (Phantom) to blue, orange, yellow, red, white and so on.
Especially for divers and divers, watchmakers Bell & Ross developed the BR02 line, in which a water resistance record of 1110 bar or 11 100 (!) Meters of depth was set (for comparison, the depth of the Mariana Trench in the Pacific Ocean is 11,022 meters - approx. )
Well, finally, today in the very first and most famous BR01 line of watches, unique turbillons are presented, which are the own development of Bell & Ross engineers. These amazing mechanisms are housed in gold or stainless steel cases and attract the attention of collectors. True, they are not cheap. On the other hand, true craftsmanship must be appreciated. And in this sense, Bell & Ross is an example of a surprisingly correct approach to the price-quality ratio. The price frames for watches from different collections, among which (and this should be noted), there have recently appeared female versions that look similar to men's watches, but are more miniature and decorated with diamonds, vary from two to one hundred and fifty thousand euros. Here already, as they say, everyone chooses for himself!
Here, perhaps, you need to put an end to the story of everything that we saw during these short two days in Paris, the “window” in which for me now for many years will look exactly like the dial of the BR01 watch - a circle inscribed in a square with rounded corners. However, the point promises to become an ellipsis, because in a few pages you will also have a conversation with two friends and business partners, the people who created the watch brand Bell & Ross and gave it their names - Bruno Belamis and Carlos Rosillo. So, do not say goodbye!
