While we were in Geneva a couple of months ago, we had the pleasure of visiting Rexhep Rexhepi at his eponymous atelier in the heart of Geneva’s Old Town. It seems like every time we return to Geneva, REXHEP REXHEPI has grown. What started as a small workshop on a quiet street has become a handful of workshops, some quite large, and a beautiful, homey visitor area above the original HQ.
Over the years, we’ve watched the steady expansion of the brand’s in-house manufacturing capabilities, now encompassing movements, dials, cases, as well as handicrafts in strap-making and enameling. Early one morning, we met with Rexhep to discuss the decision to launch an enamel workshop, labeled Émailleurs de la Cité (Enamelers of the City), and he walked us through a tour of the brand’s latest foray into watchmaking handicrafts.
The evolutionary step
One of the things that defines Rexhep is his focus on expanding the atelier’s in-house capabilities. While there is cultural cache in “in-house” manufacturing, there’s really a much more pragmatic reason for this push: it’s difficult to depend on suppliers. Both in terms of delivery schedules and quality control standards, dependence on outside workshops is a nonstop challenge for anyone in watchmaking.
Especially in the handicrafts, enameling in particular, things can go awry quickly. A delivery window might be quoted as three weeks but slip into three months, while colors may arrive inconsistent, or pieces may return flawed in subtle ways that are unacceptable at the level of REXHEP REXHEPI’s ’s quality control standards. When every dial and every detail is a reflection of the brand, “good enough” is often not quite good enough.
Two years ago, Rexhep set out to take their enamel needs in-house. The journey wasn’t straightforward, and neither is the craft of enameling. It took time to find a location, secure the right equipment, identify a leader for the workshop, and recruit the first enamelists. Now, there are seven people in the workshop, with two ovens in constant use, and the atelier has reached the point where it can produce enamel dials entirely under its own roof.
Sometimes, the hardest things are simple
Enameling may sound straightforward: powdered glass applied to a dial blank, then baked in an oven. In reality, it’s one of the most demanding processes in horology.
The complexity lies in the highly sensitive nature of enamel as a medium. Colors render differently in the baking process, depending on the metal substrate, the temperature, the duration in the oven, and the interaction with other layers. Even humidity in the room can have an effect. A beautiful, even surface can be destroyed by a microscopic bubble or a crack that emerges only after firing. What looks perfect to the naked eye may reveal a flaw once the dial is polished or cased.
For REXHEP REXHEPI, mastering enamel wasn’t about reinventing the wheel, but about respecting the material’s limitations and working with its unpredictability. That meant investing not only in ovens, grinders, and stamping machines, but also in microscopes, polishing wheels, and highly specialized hand tools. It also meant creating a workflow that accommodates failure. In enameling, rejection rates are naturally high; one in five dials might not survive the process. The discipline lies in persistence, starting again, and maintaining consistency despite setbacks.
The workshop itself is compact but perfectly organized. Two large ovens dominate one side of the room, their surfaces already darkened from daily use. Workbenches line the walls, each fitted with specialized grinders for reducing enamel powder to the precise fineness needed for uniform application. Trays of small jars hold powders in luminous shades – deep cobalt, pale sky blue, emerald green, milky white – each waiting to be mixed and fired. It is an alchemist’s corner of the atelier, where science and craft merge.
The human touch
But tools alone do not make a workshop. What impressed us most during our visit was the people: four enamelists, each bringing a different background, each still relatively young in their careers. Rexhep explained that the brand deliberately sought out craftspeople who were willing to learn the atelier’s culture rather than simply replicate old habits. In practice, that means embracing the brand’s pursuit of perfection, but also its sense of community and collaboration.
One thing that Rexhep stressed when we met him, is that enameling is a human craft. While the quality control standards are high, all handmade products show traces of the hand. There’s something about the “imperfection” of the human hand, compared to purely industrial, standardized processes, that has its allure for Rexhep. It adds character, each trace of subtle traces of the hand in the watchmaking process.
More than just an extension of REXHEP REXHEPI’s’s production line though, the enamel workshop is a statement about what Rexhep wants the brand to be. Rather than outsourcing fragile, high-risk processes, he’s chosen to embrace them, even if that means higher costs, longer training times, and a steep learning curve. The payoff is creative freedom: the ability to experiment with colors, techniques, and dial designs without waiting months for an external partner to deliver results.
This freedom is already bearing fruit. While we can’t share everything we saw during our visit, some of the prototypes in development showcase enameling at a level that rivals Geneva’s most storied maisons. There’s a freshness and confidence to the brand’s enamel work that suggests this is not just a supplementary craft, but one that could become central to the brand’s identity in the years to come.
Looking ahead, always
REXHEP REXHEPI’s growth has always been incremental, careful, and deeply rooted in the craft. From the earliest AK series to the Chronomètre Contemporain, the brand’s trajectory has never been about rapid expansion or chasing trends. Instead, it has been about building layer upon layer of skill, infrastructure, and trust in the hands that make each watch.
Walking out of the atelier into the narrow streets of Geneva’s Old Town, we couldn’t help but think about the long tradition of craftsmanship rooted in this city. Four hundred years of enameling history in Geneva—that’s the backdrop. By choosing this path, Rexhep is not just preserving heritage, he is shaping it one dial at a time.
Big shoutout and thank you to Marko Koncina, the man behind Swiss Watch Gang, for the photography of Émailleurs de la Cité enamel workshop!