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Neuchâtel
Switzerland
A brand that echoes to the vision of it’s re-creator, Hakim El Kadiri.
ELKA Watch Co. is one of our youngest microbrands, launched in 2022, but comes with decades of experience in the watchmaking industry.
How and why?
Hakim dreamt of developing his own brand but above all he wanted a brand with a story, truth & credibility.
He chose to call it by his nickname, ELKA. Since he loves the 60s, the products and the aesthetics of that era he had decided to make it the design line for this and future collections. When he wanted to protect the name, he realised that a brand called Elka Watch had already existed but had disappeared around the 60s & 70s, so precisely during the timeframe that he had chosen to base his designs on. This defunct Elka Watch was named after Eduard Louis Kiek from Amsterdam. Hakim El Kadiri looked through its archives and realised that the brand had strong designs and had worked closely with other big names in the watch industry such as Ulysse Nardin, Heuer, Rolex, Minerva, to name only a few.
Elka from the 19th and 20th century:
The company was founded in 1877 in Amsterdam by Eliazer Kiek, inventor of the tactile watch for the blind and watchmaker to Queen Juliana of the Netherlands.
In 1949, the Elka Watch en Clock Company Amsterdam opened its Swiss branch in La Chaux-de-Fonds. It produced wristwatches of course but also pocket watches, braille watches, chronographs, chess and signal clocks.
Then, in the mid-1970s, the brand disappeared along with Ernst Louis Kiek, grandson and last heir.
The ELKA Watch Co. of 2022 has no connection with the defunct Amsterdam brand. But still they wanted to pay a tribute to the old Dutch brand with their first 2 models.
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