Blackland Watch Co. | Meet the Maker
Squale was building dive watches before most people knew its name.
Most watch brands want you to know the name on the dial. Squale has a different story. For years, some of the company's most important work went into watches that carried somebody else's name.
That is a big part of why Squale matters. The company was making cases for serious diving watches when watchmakers were still figuring out how to keep water out under extreme pressure. Its history begins with the people who built those cases, not with a marketing campaign.
The von Büren workshop
Charles and Hélène von Büren established their watchmaking business in Neuchâtel, Switzerland, around 1950. Both were passionate about diving and water sports. At the time, an underwater watch was a piece of equipment, not a fashion statement. If a case leaked or a crown came loose, the consequences were a little more serious than a ruined evening.
Charles spent the 1950s working on cases that could withstand high pressure for other watch manufacturers. On July 10, 1959, he registered the Squale name, taking the French word for shark. The brand soon became associated with cases made for underwater work, often identified by the small shark emblem at six o'clock or on the case back.
The name behind some very familiar names
Here is the part of Squale's story that tends to surprise people. The company supplied dive watch cases to other respected makers, including Blancpain, DOXA, Heuer and Auricoste. In the 1960s and 1970s, Squale was an important specialist in the case itself, especially the unusual shape that protected the crown at four o'clock.
One of the better known examples is the connection with Blancpain's Fifty Fathoms. Vintage Blancpain watches exist with Squale cases, and some surviving dials carry both names. That small Squale shark is a reminder of the company that helped make the watch capable of doing its job.
A Blancpain with Squale on the dial
Only a handful of these watches have surfaced. Oliver & Clarke describes this example as a possible prototype. The two names on the dial tell the story better than a modern advertisement could.
Blancpain and others deserve their own place in dive watch history. The point is not that Squale invented the entire category. It is that Squale was one of the early specialists doing the hard work that helped the category grow.
Pressure, testing and the people who actually dived
The technical side is what makes the story worth telling. The early Squale Master was developed around the idea of surviving extraordinary water pressure. Charles worked with screw down crowns and case backs, domed crystals, seals and case construction designed to protect the movement. Later he moved the crown to four o'clock and gave it a protected position to reduce the chance of a knock underwater.
In 1968, von Büren helped establish the Maison du Plongée in Neuchâtel. It was a place where watches could be tested through actual diving, when much of today's testing machinery did not yet exist. They looked at how a watch stood up to water and pressure, how easy it was to read, and how it wore in use. Von Büren went on to serve as president of the center for several years.
Squale also records performance testing on the Italian island of Giglio as its relationship with the Maggi family developed. Testing a watch was not simply about printing a depth rating on the dial. It was about finding out whether the thing worked in the water.
That approach is still part of how Squale describes its watches today. The company says every movement is checked in four positions before assembly, and every finished watch goes through a water resistance test.
Worn by people who went deep
Squale's diving credentials are not just numbers. Italian freediver Enzo Maiorca wore a Squale Master when he set a 67 meter record. Jacques Mayol wore the Squale 2002 for his 76 meter dive in Japan. Squale later supplied watches to professional diving and military units, including the Italian Navy.
Those names matter because they explain what the watches were for. The bezel, the legibility, the case shape and the pressure rating were there to serve somebody in the water.
The case that became the 1521
By the 1970s, Squale had developed its own recognizable watches. The 1521 grew out of Charles von Büren's earlier case designs, with a 50 atmosphere rating and the crown tucked away at four o'clock. The company worked on thinner cases, dependable sealing and safer rotating bezels. It became a design people recognized even when they did not immediately recognize the name on the dial.
The modern 1521 still looks like it belongs to that family. So do the Master and other Squale divers. They are not borrowing a made up heritage. They are carrying forward the shape and ideas that came out of that original workshop.
How the Maggi family kept Squale going
The von Büren family had worked closely with the Maggi family, which distributed Squale in Italy. In 1982, as Charles prepared to retire, he sold the brand to them. The Maggi family later brought back many of Squale's best known designs. Squale remains an independent, family owned business based in Switzerland.
Why Squale belongs at Blackland
We like a watch with a reason for existing. Squale has a pretty good one.
Long before collectors started talking about case finishing and water resistance ratings, Charles von Büren was trying to make a watch survive another dive. His company built cases for other names, tested them with people who actually used them, and eventually put its own shark on the dial.
Squale deserves to be mentioned alongside the pioneers of the dive watch. Not because it can claim to have invented the whole thing, but because it helped build the equipment and the ideas that made those early watches work.
That is the Squale we want people to discover at Blackland.
Blackland Watch Co. is an authorized Squale retailer. Our watch catalog is being prepared for release, with availability confirmed before orders are accepted.
Historical references
Squale's history · The Squale Master and early testing · Squale's current testing · Hodinkee's history of Squale