How do you go about making a story fresh? If you’re Jaeger-LeCoultre, you bring under-the-radar creatives from across different fields into the fold, inviting a multitude of perspectives. That is the ethos behind Made of Makers, a programme started by the Swiss watchmaker in 2022 that initiates cross-disciplinary exchanges and dialogues. On the multivaried list of Jaeger-LeCoultre so far: patissiers and chocolatiers, visual artists and designers, perfumers and musicians. The idea is simple: when you look beyond your ken and invite different expressions, the things you stand for— creativity, precision and beauty, for instance—can reach a far wider audience.
That’s certainly the case with Jaeger-LeCoultre’s latest addition to Made of Makers: the webcomic author and artist Olivecoat. Based in Cebu in the Philippines, the artist (real name Lily Catan) is known for a style that blends classical comic codes with the digital aesthetic of webtoons. In her hands, Jaeger-LeCoultre has entrusted the retelling of one of its most cherished stories: the genesis of the famed Reverso watch.
Watch aficionados might be familiar with Reverso lore. In 1930, polo-playing officers in British India damaged countless watches on the field. It prompted a brief to build a watch resilient enough for the intense, fast-paced nature of the sport. The businessman César de Trey brought this challenge to Switzerland, with the idea of a watch case that could be flipped over to protect the delicate glass above the dial. He approached his friend Jacques-David LeCoultre to produce the watch, and the designer René-Alfred Chauvot was engaged to define the look of this new creation. Thus was the Reverso born in 1931.
Olivecoat has rendered this story in a five-chapter webtoon published and available to read on the Jaeger-LeCoultre website. The artist gives a lively face and voice to characters from history. The young, wide-eyed Jean-Pierre de Trey is our protagonist through whose eyes of wonderment we follow as he enters his father’s world of fine watches. It’s a world occupied by the unflappable Jacques-David LeCoultre, who takes the challenge of creating a watch never before seen with considerable calm; and the chic Jeanne Pellet, a secretary at the manufacture so indispensable she’s dubbed the ‘factory encyclopaedia’.
The character-led storytelling makes the watchmaker’s legend approachable, a technique that grounds much of Olivecoat’s work. “I love watching shows where the character dynamics feel fleshed out, like real humans rather than characters on a page,” says the artist. So it is for a piece of design made 94 years ago—not out of thin air, but from the combined efforts of passionate individuals.
Read the Reverso webcomic by Olivecoat.
