Just three years ago, three friends, Cédric Mulhauser, Nicolas Freudiger and Singal Depéry decided to launch their own watch brand. Bringing years of experience together, the three Swiss-born entrepreneurs had the vision of creating a brand that went against the norms of the industry, with a focus on sustainability.
Co-founders Cédric Mulhauser, Nicolas Freudiger and Singal Depéry
ID Geneve was born as the first impact native luxury watch brand, creating products that reflect the values and principles of people concerned about climate change and social and environmental impact. They create watches using recycled materials and develop new materials that have less impact on the planet. As ID Geneve’s co-founders were in Dubai for the recent edition of Dubai Watch Week, we met with Co-Founder and COO Cédric Mulhauser to find out more about this forward-thinking brand.
Tell us about the brand, how it began and where the idea came from.
The brand was born just three years ago. We launched a crowdfunding campaign on December 1, 2020. I’m the watchmaker. Nicolas Freudiger has a background in hospitality and digital marketing; he manages the PR side of the brand. The third co-founder is Singal Depéry, who is our art director and designer. All the images that you see of our watches come from his hand. He came to the brand and brought more of the durability and sustainability aspects we were missing at the time. I have known Nicolas for 30 years, and it has always a dream for us to create our own company, our own brand.
Why was this the right time to do it then?
Because we all had some good professional experiences, Nicolas was always close to the world of watchmaking. He was helping the brand I was working for as a designer and Singal was always interested in the world of watchmaking. So, we decided to create a brand with a real story. We are not just a brand like any other; our purpose is to create a new identity in the luxury world. We want to do something different. We know that luxury is not sustainable, and we want the luxury world to become a laboratory for sustainable development for other industries. That’s our mindset. We develop or co-develop materials with less carbon footprint impact, so all our choices are made with this in mind.
The first model the Circular 1 was created with 100% recycled stainless steel that is ten times less impactful than the industry average. The second collection, Circular S, is made with recycled stainless steel, which is melted in a solar furnace. So, even the energy we use is sustainable.
Tell us about some of the materials used in the watches.
On our Circular C collection, we use MIRUM, a plant-based for our straps. It’s completely natural and completely recyclable and recycled. That’s the perfect match for a circular economy. It looks like leather, but it’s not.
We collaborated with CompPair, a Swiss startup company that focuses on regenerative carbon. They use recycled fibres from wind turbines. They have developed a design that features the irregular arrangement of recycled fibres in a mould to give a granular appearance. It’s auto-regenerative.
If you heat the material, it comes back like new. We must heat it to about 90 degrees in the oven, and if there are some scratches or marks, they will completely disappear. So, it is quite a durable material to use on a watch, and it’s easy to recycle if we need to.
In a way, watches are sustainable because they last a long time, but you’re putting a new layer onto this, what would you say to that?
You’re right. It’s interesting because the product is sustainable, but what we do is look at ways to produce the products sustainably, too. That’s our mindset. We have this mission to do something maybe better than others in the industry, to show them that it is possible, and perhaps other industries will look at what we’re doing and use it in their own ways. We know we won’t save the world, but we can be an example for other industries. This is, for us, important. We are co-developing these kinds of materials in what we call our ID lab. We try to find solutions that are less impactful. Even the movements that we use are reused movements. We buy old stock and refurbish them completely.
What’s your biggest challenge as a watchmaker when trying to ensure you’re using all these sustainable elements, and how does that impact your work?
That’s an interesting question because I’m constantly asking myself how I can do better because, for example, we use plastic tools or sometimes we use plastic in our packaging. It makes me think about how we can reuse the plastic for example. The way that we produce, we must think also about these things, but watchmaking, by definition, uses old tools from our grandparents or things that we can leave for the next generation. I think we have to think more about the packaging, the supply chain, the transportation of the parts etc. We try to speak with our suppliers to find all the solutions or to reuse the packaging that they send to us. That’s the way that we try to improve. As a watchmaker, we are now thinking about developing our own movement. This is a project for the next two or three years.
Will that be using recycled parts and bringing them all together?
I think it’s difficult to do it like this. It’s what we do now, but we want to develop a new movement based on recycled materials.
Will you create them from scratch using materials?
Yes, exactly. Maybe not from scratch by ourselves. We are also in discussion with some of the big heritage brands to work on a collaboration because they have some means and know-how that we don’t have, and I think we will be able to have a big impact with this. It’s a win-win, completely.
What’s the vision for the brand looking forward?
We have talked about this within our team. Of course, we are small, so we want to become bigger and grow in the coming years, but we want to control the growth. We won’t produce 10,000 watches next year, maybe that’s an objective in 5 or 10 years, but step by step. We are now developing the UK market and the US markets. We are also here in Dubai because we are in discussion with Seddiqi. This is our target for the moment, and for sure, we want to develop all markets after, but we don’t want to go too fast.
Tell us about the partnership with Leonardo DiCaprio.
We are proud to welcome Leonardo DiCaprio to the brand. He’s hugely into sustainability and incremental issues, so it was a dream for us. We talked about who could be the best ambassador worldwide to represent our watches, and not only the watches but the concept we developed. We said, “Oh, DiCaprio is the perfect climate ambassador and climate advocate,” and we vocalised it. We never thought it would happen. One day, some friends of friends of friends contacted us and said, “We know some people who know people who know people.” So, we got in contact with his team, and we presented the project, and they loved it. They told us that Leonardo is not working with luxury brands because they do not match his values, but I think there is a match there, so we will pitch it to him.” And he loved it. It was amazing.
He has invested capital, but is he also wearing the watches?
Yes, he’s wearing the watch. The first question in watchmaking is, ‘do you like the design?’ And he liked the design. For us, that was the first big step. Then, of course, the ecosystem we developed was interesting for him. I think he can represent us well. We don’t want to be just a brand. We want to do something bigger, not in terms of volumes, but the message. For the moment, Swiss-made means quality. But we want Swiss-made to be known for its sustainability. We want people to say, “Oh, Swiss made, they are the pioneer of sustainability. They’re good quality but with new materials, less impactful.”
Why is the UAE market important to you?
We are in touch with Seddiqi, and when we look for retailers, we look at two aspects: sustainability and influence because, of course, if we want to have an impact, we need to be associated with the people who have influence. I think Seddiqi is at the top of the top in terms of influence. If they are interested in sustainability, it’s a good match because we can be the first and others will follow. That’s why we are really interested in working with Seddiqi and the UAE market. It’s a challenge for us.
What message would you send our readers to make them aware of the brand, what you’re doing, and why they should come and buy your watches?
First of all, I hope they love the design. Of course, it’s one of the first factors when buying a watch. I think the message is important. One of our taglines is: “Wear your conviction on your wrist.” For a man, a watch is one of the only jewels that you can wear, and you want to show it because luxury is about showing what you have. Maybe with ID Genève, if you wear an ID watch, you wear other kinds of values on your wrist, and that’s what we want to share.
