Ardath

 By Bruce Shawkey

Ardath was founded in 1935 in Geneva by Edmond Dreyfuss, a veteran of the watch industry. The company specialized in mass-market Roskopf watches, before moving into upscale Swiss lever watches in the 1950s. After Dreyfuss' death in 1954, the company followed industry trends, introducing waterproof watches.

In 1962, Ardath introduced the Long Distance, a pioneering dual timezone watch with two separate movements side by side in a single oversized dial, one automatic with date and the other hand-winding. This was also sold in Islamic countries as the “Wisdom” model, which showed prayer time in Mecca. In 1968, the Super Long Distance model featured two automatic movements in a long rectangular case. 

Throughout the 1960s, Ardath sold watches under the names of Ardent, Ardaco, Alverna, Long-Distance, Denis-Diver, and Reefguard, In 1985, Ardath celebrated their 50th anniversary with the Pythagore model, an avant-garde dress watch with black “skeleton” bracelet and diamond-shaped case.

The Alverna brand continued into the 1980s, with the River model launched in 1986. A skeleton mechanical version with gold bracelet similar to the Pythagore appeared the following year, followed by the novel Halo model. Ardath's final appearance at the Basel Fair came in 1993, after which the brand became defunct. 

Some models and advertisements are shown below from the mid-1960s: