The origins of Linde Werdelin to some extent goes back to 1970’ies when Morten and I met in primary school and quickly became friends. Morten’s family was in the furniture retail business and my father was the third generation in watch and jewellery retail. Growing up in Denmark in the 70s and 80s it was still unusual to go skiing in Switzerland but because my father went there to buy watches we went skiing there regularly - and I guess that’s how my passion for both started.

Fast forward to the actual beginning of Linde Werdelin; I went skiing in Canada early 2002 and found I couldn’t really leave my JLC Reverso (first sports watch?) in my room as there were no locks anywhere and I didn’t have much use for it on the mountain; when I was next in Copenhagen Morten told me about a watch he was designing for Georg Jensen aimed at sailing and with an interchangeable outer case and strap.

Then started the discussion of how one could have a beautiful mechanical timepiece while being able to attach and detach digital precision information at will. In August 2002 we establishedLinde Werdelin with that aim in mind.

For the next five years, our energy was poured into developing the two parts of this idea. The timepieces were designed and developed between the studio in Denmark and supplier partners around Switzerland - at that time assembled and tested in Bienne. The instrument/computers for skiing and diving were initially developed and produced in Denmark but later we moved production to Switzerland as well.

In 2007 the first series of Linde Werdelin watches and instruments were launched in Geneva. The Biformeter model and the Land Instrument for skiing. From 2007 began a period of development of the watch models into more complicated case structures as well as more complicated movements (always with sports in mind).

The first SpidoLite - inspired by a team climbing Mount Everest - was launched in Basel in March 2009 and set the tone for an expansion of the watch families into the Oktopus II in 2010 and work with movement makers such as Jean Francois Mojon and his team at Chronode. Between 2007 and 2015 the company grew to work with plus 60 retail partners across 30 countries.

2015 saw the beginning of significant changes to the industry. The emerging pre-owned online platforms challenged the traditional wholesale model at the same time as economic events put the traditional distribution model to the test. Limited production and a focus on personal relationships seemed to reflect what was coming rather than what had been.

In 2016 the 3 Timer family was reintroduced to balance the innovation of the Oktopus and Spido families with the origins of Linde Werdelin. In May the same year we established our own pre-owned platform - in effect taking responsibility for every watch we have ever produced. Together with customisation of new and existing watches sustainability became a growing focus of the company.

Linde Werdelin