Meet the Irish watchmaking McGonigle brothers taking the Swiss mechanical watchmakers on at their own, intricate game. Appeared originally in the November issue of International Life magazine. ‘There were eight children in the house, and all available surfaces were covered in clocks,’ says Irish watchmaker John McGonigle, describing his childhood in Athlone, Eire. His father, a compositor for the Irish Times, was also a talented amateur repairer of timepieces. It is no coincidence that out of those eight children three are watchmakers. John, 40, was inspired by his father and went to the Irish Swiss Institute of Horology in Dublin after finishing school.

His younger brother and business partner Stephen, 34, on the other hand, wasn't interested in his father's hobby: 'Oily, greasy, dirty old clocks' is how he describes the long-case time-pieces that were his father's passion. But, when he was 13, he noticed John working on something mysteriously tiny and seemingly invisible, and was intrigued. 'It struck me all of a sudden that this could be a great profession,' he explains, and he followed his brother to the Institute as soon as he could. The result is McGonigle Watches, the new innovative Irish watch brand that is causing a stir in the rarified circles of haute horology.

The McGonigle brothers specialise in the highly-skilled branch of watch-making classified as ‘complicated’. ‘Complicated’ means that the watch, in addition to its time keeping action, has extensions – a stop watch, alarm or calendar are all classified as complications, but so are some extremely intricate mechanisms aimed at improving performance.

A watch is basically a case with a little mechanical computer inside – an intricate but elegant device. And ‘little’ is an understatement. Miniscule is closer to the mark. ‘No one is surprised when computer does a new trick,’ says John. ‘But when a mechanical device does it, there’s a certain magic.’ It is the human dimension – skills passed down and developed through many generations - that supplies the intrigue and mystique.

At soon as each brother had graduated from the Institute, they travelled from Ireland, mending watches and honing their skills as they went. John went from Manchester to Bermuda: ‘Where there is wealth, you tend to find prestigious watch brands such as Rolex, Patek Philippe, Audenars Piguet, Cartier and increasingly examples of the independent watchmakers’ art’ – which is where the new McGonigle brand fits in. Stephen went to London, and spent a year repairing a wide variety of brands at Somlo Antiques in Piccadilly - still one of the top restoration houses in England.

Switzerland, the apogee of watch making, was both brothers' desired destination. But Swiss mechanical watch making had been nearly destroyed in the 1970s with the advent of the quartz mechanism. Employment in the watch industry dropped from 90,000 to 40,000 and it looked like an end to intricate skills honed over centuries. But big companies like Patek Philippe - whose founder had invented the wrist watch in the 19th century - and Audenars Piguet kept the faith against all logic through the lean times.

Their gamble paid off when collectors’ interest in the real thing re-ignited. At the end of the 1980s the boom in top-end mechanical watches began to snowball. There’s been an increase in sales of mechanical watches year on year ever since. The clever wearable brand Swatch, which kicked off in in the 1980s, also drew attention back to Swiss watch making. The industry was turned on its head and re-energised.

The brothers found themselves working together for Christophe Claret, who specialises in the manufacture of complications, and is the largest supplier to other companies – which, unusually, are happy to acknowledge Claret’s complex and extreme contributions. 'The Swiss tend to follow the rule book,' says Stephen, 'But Christophe allowed me to make my first minute repeater when I was just a year out of college. If I had been in one of the major companies, it would have been 10 to 20 years before I could have created my own watch.'

‘You don’t hear of many people passing a quartz watch on to their descendants, do you?’ says John, who has two children of his own. ‘A mechanical watch, on the other hand, the product of centuries of research and development, and beautifully made by hand, is a natural heirloom.’

The McGonigles manufacture nearly all the parts themselves, except some that are made by specialists – ‘Just like car manufactures go to specialists for windscreens,’ says John. ‘But there is a pleasure in making the parts, so we do more and more ourselves.’

It is beguiling listening to John talk passionately about pivots less than the thickness of a human hair; the balance – the time-keeping organ of the watch that ‘almost breathes as it swings back and forth', and the miraculous tourbillon, invented by Abraham Louis Breguet 200 years ago, in which they currently specialise.

The tourbillon – whirlpool in French – is designed to balance the forces of gravity when the watch changes position as its wearer moves about. As its name suggests, the tourbillon revolves every 60 seconds to keep a good average time. A traditional watch does balance the various forces to get as good a time as possible, but the tourbillion takes it one step further with three elements – balance, palets and the escape wheel – attached to the cage. Quartz will always keep better time, but simply lacks the beauty and ingenuity of centuries of human input.

McGonigle watches are beautiful objects in their own right - John credits Stephen with a very strong sense of style and design. But both are perfectionists when it comes to the movement, taking enormous pleasure in the ultimate refinements of their art. 'We are doing this for our own satisfaction,' they say. Each of the10 McGonigle watches produced a year is signed by the brother who made it, they only occasionally collaborate over single parts. The mechanism is constructed of steel, with the odd tiny jewel, and the back is a swirling pattern of Celtic design, the 'glass' is synthetic sapphire - through which some of the movement is visible - the strap alligator. Not native to Ireland, as John is quick to point out.

'Our customers always stay in touch with us,' says John. 'Even when people can't see or understand the intricacies inside, something seeps through of the almost fetishistic attention to detail. They contact us to say, "Did you actually do that?" in delighted astonishment.'

Not content with perfecting the first Irish tourbillon, the brothers are working on a top secret project that will form the basis of future complicated watches. 'It is a simpler piece we have spent years researching and developing, as it has to be the best possible base for complications. It's really unusual - there is the possibility of a patent,' says Stephen, before clamming up – but in the most charming and apologetic way. Neither brother would tell me more. I’m intrigued. Watch this space.