Instead of the expensive hand-finished, jewelry-grade cases of Jean Lassale, this new line would use the cheaper plated base metal cases as on mine and mass-production techniques of regular Seikos, but they would be fitted with Seiko’s best movements, considered close rivals in quality to the Swiss. Seiko would produce this new line entirely in Japan. They were priced at about double the regular Seiko line at $375-$595, and carried a large profit margin for the company. Īccording to my reading of Seiko’s own “journey in time” they say Lassale was introduced in 1985 but my watch shows it was actually was bought out in 1981. Seiko fitted Jean Lassale’s with their own quartz movements already developed in 1977-1979 for their Credor line.
Those ended up with the company who made the movements for Lassale, who now licensed them instead to Piaget. However, Seiko did not acquire the rights to the original Lassale mechanical movements.
Seiko bought the small, high end Swiss watch company called Jean Lassale, founded in 1976 and specializing in ultra thin watches of about 3mm, with the world’s thinnest mechanical movements of only 1.2mm thick. This is the result of my research prompted by my ownership of a Seiko Lassale. As many of you know horological histories always interest me and Seiko more than most.