Maurice Lacroix Aikon Automatic Date 35mm Ladies Watch Black Mother Of Pearl

Maurice Lacroix began in 1975 as a brand of the Desco von Schulthess group, a Zurich trading house that had been assembling watches at Saignelégier in the Jura since 1961. The name was invented rather than inherited — there was no Maurice Lacroix — and the brand was built for export markets from the start.

Its serious watchmaking credentials date from 1989, when the company acquired the case and component manufacturer Queloz, giving it in-house production capability that most brands at its price point lacked. Maurice Lacroix went on to develop its own calibres, the ML series, from 2006.

The Masterpiece collection is where the technical ambition sits. The Masterpiece Régulateur, the Calendrier Rétrograde, and particularly the Masterpiece Gravity — which exposes a silicon escapement suspended in a large dial aperture — established the house as capable of genuine complication work rather than assembly.

The Aikon, launched in 2016, changed the company commercially. It descends from the Calypso of 1990 and uses an integrated bracelet with six articulated arms flanking the bezel, offering the steel luxury sports watch format at a fraction of the usual entry price. It is now the brand's core product.

Maurice Lacroix remains based at Saignelégier and produces both quartz and mechanical lines.