Founded in 1917 in Legnau, Switzerland (and originally begun as Schlup & Co.), Rado has always been a cutting-edge Avant-Garde brand. It began using the Rado name in 1957, and over the years, the brand has experimented with many different materials for its watches. Rado was the first to introduce a “scratch-proof”  watch, the DiaStar 1, in 1962 that took the world by storm.  In the ensuing decades, it introduced colored versions of the DiaStar, and by the mid-1980s became the first watch brand to create high-tech ceramic bracelet watches.  Since then, the “master of materials” has regularly surprised and delighted watch lovers with sophisticated metals, bold colors, and contemporary aesthetics

History of Rado

Brothers Fritz, Ernst, and Werner founded the Schlup & Co. watchmaking factory in 1917 in a converted area of their parents’ house. This humble workshop would later become what we know today as Rado. Even though they started very modestly, by the end of World War II, the factory was among the world’s largest producers of watch movements.

It was only in the 1950s that Schlup & Co. started selling watches under the Rado brand name. The iconic Golden Horse collection made its première in 1957, and the Green Horse collection followed in 1958. At the end of the decade, Rado was a truly international brand present in over 61 countries.