Cartier

Paris jeweller turned watchmaker, whose shaped cases (Tank, Santos, Crash) made form the subject rather than the container.

Founded in Paris in 1847 by Louis-François Cartier.
The Santos-Dumont of 1904 was made for the aviator Alberto Santos-Dumont, who wanted to read the time without letting go of the controls.
The Tank arrived in 1917, its case taking its lines from the tracks of a tank seen from above.
Shaped cases are the house signature; the London workshop's Crash of 1967 is the most extreme of them.
The Cartier Challenge trophy watch, the Cheich, was made for consecutive winners of the Paris-Dakar rally, four examples between 1983 and 1985.