« A watch manufacture with tradition and maritime DNA »
The company Mühle Glashütte holds a special place among the renowned watchmakers of Glashütte. It is the only one of these companies that is still owned by a long-established Glashütte family to this day. It is also probably the company from the Saxon watchmaking town with the most "maritime DNA." Is this reflected in its quality, and what defines Mühle quality? You'll find the answers here.
Nearly a century and a half of success in the watch market through quality
The history of Mühle Glashütte – known to watch connoisseurs for models such as the Teutonia 2, the Terrasport watches, or the S.A.R. Rescue-Timer – now spans nearly a century and a half. That also corresponds to five generations of the founding family, which has lived in the Glashütte area for more than 700 years.
In 1869, Robert Mühle founded a precision engineering workshop that initially focused on producing high-precision measuring instruments for Glashütte's still-young watch industry, and later expanded its product range to include other instruments such as rev counters and speedometers.
Incidentally, the founder, born in 1841 in Lauenstein near Glashütte, was originally named George Albert Mühle and only later adopted the first name Robert, presumably after the early death of his wife and their son Robert. In its advertisements, the company recommended, for example, "its finely crafted measuring tools according to the metric system," charged "moderate prices" for its high quality, and offered a "guarantee for the accurate functioning of the apparatus." Thanks to the high quality of its products, the company quickly earned a good reputation and was able to keep expanding.
Around 1900, Mühle was able to manufacture so-called dial gauges capable of measuring to an accuracy of one thousandth of a millimeter – all without any electronics. Interestingly, watches in the true sense were not yet part of the product range at first, even though the company, with its production of measuring instruments, was an important part of the Glashütte watch industry from the very beginning and closely tied to its quality. In fact, the company, then still operating as "Robert Mühle & Sohn," did not enter the watch market until the 1920s – and it did so indirectly, by way of a "detour": supplying automobiles with the necessary instruments.
Clocks for renowned car brands, nautical instruments, and high-quality wristwatches
Alongside speedometers and rev counters, these included car clocks, which Mühle supplied to several well-known German automobile brands in the years after World War I. Its customers included such illustrious names as DKW, Horch, and Maybach. BMW motorcycles were also fitted with speedometers from the Glashütte precision instrument maker.
Soon the company's instruments were installed not only in vehicles but also on ships and yachts, and the company added various nautical instruments to its product range.
Elisabeth Mühle, née Stübner, also brought a special connection to the maritime world. She was the wife of Hans, a grandson of the founder born in 1903, and came from a family that specialized in making chronometers for timing lighthouse beacons. By the time the fourth generation of the family was running the business at the latest, the profile that has been maintained to this day had taken shape, encompassing both the production of nautical instruments and high-quality wristwatches.
The founding family expropriated twice
The end of World War II brought dramatic changes to the Glashütte watch industry. Numerous businesses were dismantled and expropriated by the communist authorities. The firm "R. Mühle & Sohn," which by then had existed for more than 75 years, did not escape this fate either. Nevertheless, in this difficult situation Hans Mühle immediately founded a new family-run precision engineering business – in December 1945 – operating as "Ing. Hans Mühle." The fresh start succeeded, and within just a few years the workforce grew from three to sixty. The new company supplied the photo and film industry with drive and escapement mechanisms and – as the sole manufacturer in East Germany – produced pointer mechanisms used in pressure and temperature gauges. Whatever Mühle made, the quality of its products and parts made it a success.
After the death of the company's re-founder in 1970, his son Hans-Jürgen Mühle carried on his life's work until the family was expropriated for a second time in the wave of nationalization in 1972. The company subsequently became "VEB Feinmechanik Glashütte," but continued for another eight years as an independent operation with Hans-Jürgen as plant manager. The company strove for quality, but industrial shortages in the GDR meant doing whatever was possible.
A fresh start after German reunification
In 1980, the former family business finally lost its independence and was integrated into VEB Glashütter Uhrenbetriebe (GUB) as "Betriebsteil 7 Mess- und Regeltechnik" (Unit 7, Measurement and Control Technology). From then on, Mühle worked in that company's sales department and later became its head of sales. His responsibilities included the worldwide sales of marine chronometers and ship's clocks as well as the sale of wristwatches in Eastern Europe. Ten years later, however, German reunification opened up a new perspective for Mühle and his team.
After being appointed one of GUB's five managing directors in 1990 and helping shape its transformation into a market-economy company, he left to re-establish his family business as "Mühle-Glashütte GmbH nautische Instrumente und Feinmechanik." He benefited from the worldwide contacts with yacht builders and shipyards he had built up as GUB's head of sales. On April 1, 1994, together with two employees, he began producing marine chronometers and ship's clocks, and two years later the new company launched its first wristwatches.
First wristwatches and new technical milestones
The decisive impetus for developing its own wristwatches once again came from an inquiry by a shipyard the manufacture supplied, which had asked in 1995 whether the Glashütte precision engineering company could also deliver some water-resistant, rugged wristwatches in Mühle quality as ship's equipment.
Since the company had the necessary expertise, Mühle agreed and made the requested watches. These first models, considered merely part of the ship's equipment and therefore not yet given a name of their own, were soon followed by the men's sport diver's watch and the Marinefliegeruhr I – the first Mühle watches offered for general sale. A little later, Mühle Glashütte launched the S.A.R. Rescue-Timer, of which a total of 56 pieces were handed over in 2002 to the sea rescuers of the German Maritime Search and Rescue Service (DGzRS), where they have been in continuous field testing ever since.
Key technical milestones included the further development of the Glashütte swan-neck fine adjustment into a particularly shock-resistant, patented woodpecker-neck regulation in 2003, the new in-house Mühle three-quarter plate designated MU 9408 in 2008, and the first in-house hand-wound movement, caliber MU 9411, in 2011. The latter debuted in the Teutonia III.
2007: The fifth generation takes the helm
Since 2007, the company has been run in the fifth generation by Thilo Mühle, who joined the firm in 2000 and had shared management duties with his father since 2004.
Until 2013, the range focused primarily on functional wristwatches, divided into the model lines 29er, M 29, Lunova, ProMare, Rasmus 2000, S.A.R. Rescue-Timer, Seebataillon GMT, Terranaut, Terrasport, and Teutonia. Since 2014, there has also been the manufacture line "R. Mühle & Sohn," launched to mark the family company's 145th anniversary. Special in-house calibers and an extra measure of quality are intended to be the result of this new line.
