There is a moment in enameling where the dial is no longer metal, but not yet finished. It has passed through fire, cooled, and carries a surface that feels both fragile and resolute at the same time. This moment is where we learned the most.

ETIEN did not begin with grand feu enamel. Like many young ateliers, we started with techniques that allowed us to understand color, form, and surface without the risks that fire introduces. That period was not a shortcut, nor a compromise. It was a necessary stage — one that taught us how light behaves, how thickness changes perception, and how small decisions on the dial affect the way a watch is experienced on the wrist.

Over time, however, a question became difficult to ignore: What feels honest to the object we want to make?

Grand feu enamel does not forgive uncertainty. Once a dial enters the kiln, control gives way to consequence. Temperature, timing, material purity — every variable matters, and none can be rushed. Some dials fail without warning. Others survive, changed in ways that cannot be repeated. Working with fire is less about mastery than it is about attention.

We chose to bring enameling in-house for this reason. Not to claim independence, but to remain close to the process. Enamel reveals its lessons slowly. Outsourcing would have distanced us from the very things we needed to understand. When a dial cracks or warps, it is not a defect to be hidden — it is information.

Flinqué enamel adds another layer of responsibility. Beneath the glass lies a guilloché surface, engraved with patterns that exist to interact with light. Once sealed under enamel, these patterns can no longer be corrected. Any imprecision is amplified, not obscured. The dial becomes a dialogue between structure and transparency, where depth is created not by decoration, but by the movement of light itself.

This interaction is subtle. Flinqué does not announce itself. It reveals its character slowly — through motion, angle, and time spent with the watch. In certain light, the dial appears calm and restrained. In others, it becomes unexpectedly vivid. This variability is not an effect we attempt to control. It is the nature of the material.

The thickness of our dials reflects this reality. Grand feu enamel requires layers. Each firing adds depth, but also tension. The result is a dial significantly thicker than what modern watchmaking typically accommodates. Rather than force the enamel to conform, we chose to design the watch around it. Thinness, in this context, is not an objective. Balance is.

What we are learning through this process is patience. Not the romantic idea of patience, but the practical kind — the discipline to accept rejection rates, to slow production, and to allow the craft to set its own limits. Progress in enameling is rarely visible day to day. It emerges quietly, over months, sometimes years.

ETIEN is still early in this journey. We do not believe mastery is something to declare. At best, it is something to approach carefully. Each dial that survives the kiln carries the marks of its making — not as flaws, but as evidence of time, heat, and decision.

In the end, this is why we continue. Not because enamel is rare, or difficult, or admired. But because it demands presence. It insists that we pay attention, that we accept uncertainty, and that we allow the material to speak for itself.

This is what working with fire has taught us so far.