French term for 'sketch'. In watchmaker's jargon, the rough movement of a watch is described as an 'ébauche'. A functional movement consists of a vacuum movement, an escapement, a balance wheel in the shape of a circle and its spiral balance spring, a mainspring, a dial and hands. An ébauche is a complete movement (plates, bridges, gear train, steel components) without an escapement, balance, hairspring, mainspring, dial and hands. Depending on the recipient's specifications, ébauches are currently available with or without pressed jewels. The French word chablon, for which there is no English equivalent, is sometimes used in the context of movement blanks. A chablon is a set of unassembled components for an entire calibre or for various parts of a calibre. Movement blanks are produced by specialised companies (e.g. Eta, Nouvelle Lémania, Frédéric Piguet).

A specially constructed mechanical watch that provides a minimum of 168 hours or one week of power reserve. The "Hebodmas" (the name means "seven days"), which debuted in 1913, had a large barrel that covered the entire surface of its movement. The long, shaped movements of the 1930s had normal-sized barrels, but their gear trains were augmented with two additional intermediate wheels. An eight-day movement is an unusual and special feature for domestic and other larger clocks. Interesting wristwatches with long-duration power reserves became available again around 1990. To help their owners remember to wind them, these mechanical marathons typically have power reserve displays.

An elegant watch model typically has three hands to show hours, minutes, and seconds, as well as a particularly slim case and discreet design. Because of their puristic design, elegant watches can be combined particularly well with clothes and are appropriate for almost any style of dress.

“Émail' is the French word for 'enamel', a vitrifiable substance that can be given various colours and fused onto the surface of metals, either to protect or to decorate the substrate. Enamel consists of silica sand and calcium fluoride to which lead oxide, borax and soda ash are added. The mixture is first melted at 1,200 degrees Celsius, then flash cooled. The resulting granules are ground into powder together with the colouring agents, which include: antimony, zirconium oxide or titanium dioxide for white enamel; cobalt oxide, chromium oxide or other colouring agents for coloured enamel. Layers of enamel are brushed or sprayed onto the clean metal substrate, or the entire metal piece is dipped into the enamel. Then the coated piece is fired in a special oven at a temperature of 800 to 900 degrees Celsius. The enamelling technique has been used on watch dials and cases for over 350 years. During the first decades of the 20th century, enamelled dials were practically standard equipment on fine wristwatches. Partly due to the expense involved in their manufacture, enamelled dials have become rather rare in recent decades.

An unpierced jewel, flat on one side and convex on the other. The flat side of the endstone is placed on the balance jewel to limit the vertical play of the balance staff. Balance rod bearings are generally fitted with end stones. In the highest quality gauges, end stones are also used for pallet rod and escape wheel bearings.

The potential to complete work. Potential energy is needed to power the gear train of a clock. In a mechanical watch, the source of this energy can be a mainspring (spring force) or a lifted weight (force of gravity). The electrical energy required by a quartz clock can be supplied by an accumulator, a battery or a capacitor.

In theory, it should always be possible to create a perfectly balanced assembly consisting of the balance and its spring. Even in practice, near perfection is not unattainable. Perfection can be achieved by adjusting the weight screws on the edge of the balance, or by milling grooves or drilling holes in the rim. But the pleasure derived from this elaborate 'balancing act' is short-lived because sooner or later the centre of gravity almost always moves away from the centre of the balance. This results in errors in the centre of gravity affecting the speed of a mechanical clock held upright.

A mechanism that incrementally channels energy from the mainspring to the oscillating systems (balance and balance spring) of a watch and prevents the gear train from running forward uncontrolled. Among its other components, the escapement consists of the escape wheel with its pinion and pallets with its twin pallet jewels and fork. Most of today's high-quality wristwatches are based on a Swiss anchor escapement. This name comes from the specific shape of the pallets and the geometry of the escapement system, which was invented in Switzerland. The escapement of a mechanical wristwatch performs a very arduous job. If the frequency of the balance is 28,800 beats per hour, the escapement allows the gear train to advance 691,200 individual increments each day. After four years, this is equivalent to more than one billion pulses and exceeds the work of a human heart by six times.

The French term 'établisseur', for which there is no English equivalent, indicates a watchmaker who buys components (movements, dials, hands, cases, etc.) from specialist manufacturers, then further processes and assembles these components to produce complete watches.