THE WORKSHOP - WHERE UNIQUE SOLUTIONS ARE BORN

Every Bexei Watch that was and will ever be made is one of its kind – a unique work of art, a creation that is built around the customer’s ideas and are realized exclusively by Aaron.

Let us invite you to pay a virtual visit to Aaron’s workshop, where he designs and crafts all his creations, from scratch to finish. 

All collections offered by Bexei Watches are conceived 100% in-house, including not just the case-, dial- and movement designs, but also the exact specifications of every single component that is ever built into a Bexei timepiece.

There are no collaborations with outsider movement manufacturers, no “homages” paid to old movement layouts – every wheel and screw, bridge and hand expresses Aaron’s, an AHCI master watchmaker’s very own idea of horology.

BIRTH FROM SCRATCH

Aaron – having studied computer aided design at the School of Technical Sciences of Budapest and graduated with a special award from the Chamber of Engineering of Budapest – designs all watch and clock movements and their parts on paper as well as on the computer. He uses CAD/CAM design to quite literally craft all components from scratch in the world of “virtual reality”.

The first stage of realizing his plans is through prototyping, and creating the rough parts on his bespoke CNC machine that he himself built and programmed, tailored to suit his most specific requirements. Despite the use of computer controlled milling machines to create the basic shape of components, Aaron hand-drills all threaded holes, hand-bevels and polishes all edges, hand-applies black mirror finishing, perlage and Côtes-de-Genève striping.

IN-HOUSE MANUFACTURING...from a to z

Here you can see the steps of how Aaron crafts an anchor that will find its way into a Bexei Dignitas Pure movement – join us and discover the unprecedented amount of effort and attention to detail it takes to create just one of the aprox. 200  components of a Bexei Dignitas timepiece.

In most cases less than four iterations of the same rough component are made at the same time – pictured above is a titanium plate, with two sets of four anchors cut, with the first cut not having met Aaron’s exacting specifications.

Once the rough cut has been checked to meet all the specific tolerances – which extent to a few microns – the nearly two days long hand-finishing work on a single piece of anchor begins.

HAND-FINISHING

Once the rough parts have been CNC-cut, computer-controlled machines are substituted with the highest quality traditional watchmaking tools. 

Pictured here is a thread-cutter that is used to create a 0.40 millimeter thread into some of the holes seen on the rough-cut anchor pictured here.

As opposed to relying on a supplied escapement, Aaron designs and makes his own balance wheel, anchor, pallet jewels, and scales the hairsprings used in his watches – a feat only an extremely limited number of independent watchmakers in the world can claim their own.

Once the rough cut has been checked to meet all the specific tolerances – which extent to a few microns – the nearly two days long hand-finishing work on a single piece of anchor begins.

Aaron works under a microscope and uses a set of different tools and pastes, to remove a genuinely microscopic amount of material from the anchor, crafting all its sides and edges to perfection.

Pictured here is the anchor ready to be "hand-crafted": from here on, once the raw component has been machined with the CNC, only human hands touch this component.

The first thing to notice is the uniquely crafted brass holder, on which the anchor rests. While bespoke designed components are a guarantee for the highest quality and the greatest achievements in fine watchmaking, they also necessitate the creation of bespoke tools.

Notice the hand-polished beveled edge in progress: Aaron hand-polishes the edge under a microscope, making sure that the beveled edge is even and shines in a way only hand-polishing can achieve. Pictured above, the anchor is again on the same holder, but now work has been performed on its edges. Sure,  it still is not perfect, but its width is already beautifully even and its polish is about to reach its final form. The top however is still relatively rough, necessitating plenty of polishing work to be performed to make sure it meets the stellar aesthetics of all the other bridges, wheels, screws and pinions of a Bexei movement.

The end result speaks for itself: a perfectly even, highly reflective “black mirror polish” has been applied to the top of the anchor (as seen on the lower piece). The beveled edges flow perfectly in line with the shape of the anchor, this incremental component which is just another one of the hundreds of parts that Aaron himself designs, manufactures, decorates and assembles.

When You make the decision to order your own Bexei timepiece, you may rest assured that every single component in your bespoke watch goes through the exact same demanding and painstaking process that we presented to you above. All bridges, gold and titanium wheels, pinions, screws, anchors and every other component is designed, crafted, decorated and assembled by Aaron in an effort to offer you not just an incredibly fine watch, but quite possibly the most detailed and refined item in any collection.