The fruit of a collaborative effort between the Geneva tourist office and a private entrepreneur with a passion for watches, the Route de l’Horlogerie de Genève (Geneva Watch Tour) offers a unique experience through a meeting of two worlds synonymous with escapism: watch shopping and tourism.
The heart of the world’s luxury watchmaking, Geneva is home to the highest concentration on the planet of mono and multi brand boutiques per km2, as well as many cultural institutions dedicated to showcasing the art of measuring time. A pedestrian itinerary now provides an opportunity to admire them while visiting the town’s most emblematic quarters and by walking in the footsteps of Swiss watchmaking history. The Geneva Watch Tour is available in three languages (English, Chinese and French) and two versions – notably on-line and in pocket card format: cultural and historic, and shopping. The Geneva Watch Tour map is also available from the Geneva Tourist Office as part of its collection entitled Geneva Amazing Experiences, in hotels and some boutiques.
Geneva’s watchmaking DNA
Do you know the watchmaking origins of Geneva’s famous Jet d’Eau? Do you know where to find the longest seconds hand in the world and the highest clock? More than any other city in the world, Geneva is characterised by its watchmaking DNA, symbolised in 1601 by the first watchmakers corporation in the world entitled “Maîtrise des horlogers de Genève”. This watchmaking spirit that is omnipresent in the streets of the best known town in Switzerland is manifest in an unparalleled collection of 50 monobrand boutiques and 50 multibrand retailers spread across the centre of town. In a worldwide exclusive, the Geneva Watch Tour allows visitors to get to know the city from a new angle that is both fun and diverse, and where the osmosis between tourism and shopping results in an experience that is as incomparable as it is memorable.
The experience of a symbolic tour
The Watch Tour provides an overall perspective of the Swiss watchmaking panorama, while paying a visit to Geneva’s most symbolic neighbourhoods – the area where the tourist office is located near the lakefront for a start, as well as the business quarter in the city centre, the old town with its art and decoration galleries, the bank and cultural institutions district and their magnificent historical buildings, as well as the modern art quarter which stretches from the Patek Philippe Museum to the Manufacture F. P. Journe.
Routes and profiles of boutiques can be found free of charge on www.genevawatchtour.com (in English, Chinese and French), and are also available as mobile versions. The referencing of boutiques and brands in Geneva makes it possible to pick out favourite watches in advance and pinpoint them on the map. And as a perfect complement, www.geneva-tourism.ch gives details of the cultural and historical aspects of the Watch Tour with a downloadable map.
