Come back of a Legend TUW Ruhla German made watches

Sigmund Jähn was the first German

TUW Ruhla is a German brand named after its place of origin “Ruhla” a town in eastern Germany. The town is infamous for its long history of watchmaking which dates back to 1862. The Ruhla brand is known for several important firsts in the global watch industry.

Ruhla  Germany

Two brothers George and Christian Thiel established the foundation for the Ruhla clock tradition in 1862. The brand’s actual journey commenced in 1874 with music boxes and then clock manufacturing. The world’s first mass-manufactured pocket watch, the “Fearless” was produced by the company in 1892 and experienced massive success in North America as being economical, dependable, and precise. The company continued to grow and distinguished itself as one of the largest watch manufacturers in Germany.

The first wristwatch was introduced in 1908 fashioned after the successful ladies’ pocket watch models “Darling” and “Divina”. It was the world’s first mass-produced wristwatches for both men and women. The business model adopted by the company from its inception was to decrease cost using economies of scale which was in turn reflected in the savings for the consumer. This approach enabled them to set up and dominate the low-cost watch market in Germany and the United States. The quality and longevity of the Ruhla watches have thereafter increased significantly.

pocket watch models

In 1978, Sigmund Jahn, the first German astronaut carried four Ruhla watches with him on his mission, making Ruhla watches the first German watches in space. The Ruhla specialists designed a multi-function electronic quartz stopwatch for recording experiments’ timing in space as well as a special souvenir watch for the astronauts. Jahn wore the watch himself, the legendary “Interkosmos” model. The model established Ruhla as a watchmaking brand that made history.Sigmund Jähn

The brand experienced a revival in 2006 when two entrepreneurs, Gunther Beck and Alexander Lange, created an online watch store. The success of the watch store allowed these Thuringen born entrepreneurs to revive the Ruhla brand as Thüringer Uhren Werke (TUW) Ruhla which stands for Thuringian Watchworks Ruhla. The founder envisions the resurgence of not only the Ruhla name but the watches. Their collection is inspired by Ruhla watches from the 1950s onwards, attempting to collaborate the Ruhla’s classic designs and the twenty-first century. The new collections are assembled in Ruhla, Germany with the highest quality watches and German made leather straps. It revives all the significant aspects of the original brand reputation – inexpensive pricing, durability, and accuracy.

Interkosmos Black