VOLCY BLOCH ON THE CONVICTIONS SHAPING TRILOBE

Trilobe was never meant to follow a conventional path. When Gautier Massonneau and Volcy Bloch began working together in 2018, the two shared little more than a desk, an idea, and an ambition to approach watchmaking differently. The business that emerged would ultimately bear little resemblance to its earliest plans, but the principles behind it have remained remarkably consistent: creativity, conviction, and a determination to take the work seriously without taking themselves too seriously.

That evolution has accelerated in recent years. What was initially conceived as a zero-capex, Swiss-made proposition focused largely on France has developed into a predominantly international business, supported by retail partners and, crucially, a Manufacture in Paris. With watchmakers, engineers, designers, research and development, after-sales service, and quality control increasingly brought under one roof, Trilobe has steadily built the technical foundation to match the distinct visual language that defined its earliest watches.

The X-Nihilo calibre represents perhaps the clearest expression of that progression. Conceived as a fresh beginning for the brand’s movement architecture, it carries forward Trilobe’s signature rotating display while reflecting years of accumulated technical knowledge. Its arrival also coincided with another significant step for the brand: an integrated bracelet, a more mature approach to case construction, and a collection that Bloch describes as a milestone in Trilobe’s development.

Yet throughout the conversation, mechanics are only part of the story. Bloch repeatedly returns to purpose, consistency, and the distinctly French character that Trilobe is continuing to cultivate. From the Château and its playful relationship with French wine to a new Paris showroom intended to embrace gastronomy, pâtisserie, design, fragrance, books, poetry, and other forms of French savoir-faire, the ambition is becoming broader without losing sight of the idea with which Trilobe began. In our conversation, Bloch reflects on that journey, the decisions that reshaped the company, and where its restless creative energy might take it next.

THG: Can we get you to do an introduction of yourself, how you got into the brand, how you met Gautier, and the beginning of the story?

VOLCY: My name is Volcy. I am French, born and raised in Paris, but I also had the chance to work in the watch industry in Hong Kong. I have three children.

I met Gautier more by chance. He had this concept, this idea of creating Trilobe. I had the chance to meet with him, and we spent a lot of time chatting about the project at the time. We decided to move forward together. He was a young boy at the time at only 25 years old. The two of us started on a student table and launched the brand a couple of months after we started initiating the project, in December 2018.

THG: Was there something that Gautier said or did that really convinced you that this is a project you want to do?

VOLCY: I could see from the discussions we had that there was a lot of ambition on the project, a lot of creativity. He wanted to do things very seriously, without taking himself too seriously, but with creative energy and a lot of passion. These are the kinds of things that really matter to me. I think both of us are driven by the same shared values. We have been working at the same desk for the last eight years now—and we've never fought.

We do discuss things through, though. We do not necessarily approach things exactly the same way, but I think from the beginning, we have the same vision, the same ambition, and the same values. That is very important when you develop a business and develop a brand. We really work with passion, enthusiasm, energy, creativity, and no limits.

There was a sentence that I love, which Gautier says sometimes. In France, we say, "When you have a problem, you find a solution." With Trilobe, we say, "We will transform a problem into a strength." We are really driven by conviction. That is why we have this signature, this brand signature: Time moves, purpose stays. We are really animated by this.

THG: So, purpose is the cornerstone...

VOLCY: Yes, purpose! But also conviction about the concept, conviction about the ambition, and the way we foresee ourselves in the next 10 years. Conviction in the people that surround us—the values that we share—and conviction that we are doing differently, but seriously. That is what animates us every single day.

THG: And is that how you built your team?

VOLCY: Yeah, completely. When someone wants to join the team, it is not like a classical interview. We want to make sure that the full team is aligned and comfortable with a new person joining the team, because it is very important that the entire team is aligned with the same commitment and the same convictions, again and again. I think this is one of our strengths, clearly.

THG: You talked about having a 10-year plan. Was the Manufacture also part of the plan from the beginning?

VOLCY: Not at all. The funny thing is that the first business plan we did is completely different from what we have done. At the beginning, we were very proud to say that we are a zero-capex company while being Swiss-made, fully focused on the French market because we are French, not at all international, direct B2C and no B2B, and trying to keep things at the lowest price as possible.

Finally, we are a full hard-capex company with a full investment in a Manufacture, while being 95 per cent international. We realised how important it is to have exceptional retail partners like The Hour Glass—who are a key partner for us—because it helps us to build the credibility and recognition of the brand.

The plan is now completely different, but talking about the 10-year plan, finally, we are French-made and not Swiss-made.

Nothing happens as expected, but one thing has never changed: the ambition that we have behind the brand, and the creativity as well. When I was talking about the 10-year plan, probably one of the easiest parts of developing Trilobe was the creativity. Gautier never stopped drawing, creating, and sketching. We have probably hundreds of hundreds of drawings in the basket. That is, I would say, the easy part.

And consistency, as well. Consistency is important when you have a conviction and ambition; you need to make sure that everything that you do is very consistent with the vision that you carry for the brand.

THG: It's been three and a half years since you set up the Paris workshop. Looking back, is there anything you'd do differently if you were starting again today?

VOLCY: No, I think the major difference is this: we are not watchmakers, we are not Swiss, and we do not have all these backgrounds. The fact that we have watchmakers now—we have a team of 10 people, and half of the team actually used to work for Patek Philippe—so we have very talented watchmakers. I think it has helped us to dive more into the technicality and the quality of our watches. We really managed to implement excellent quality processes. We are much more skilled, somehow. We did not have that skill at the beginning, so we internalised all the skills in order to develop over the next 10 years. That makes a big difference, yes.

It is not that it has changed our approach, but I think we are more serious about what we are doing. We have after-sales service under control; we have implemented the best quality-control processes that we could do. We added excellence to our processes, I would say.

THG: I can definitely see the improvement with the Trente-Deux, which is like the first watch that came out after the workshop started. But why did you choose to go into the integrated sports watch category when it is so crowded? What made you decide to choose this as the watch to launch the first Manufacture movement and the first watch of the collection?

VOLCY: When we decided to make this move into a fully integrated Manufacture, we thought, "Okay, it is important we come up with a new calibre." That is why we call it the X-Nihilo calibre, because we started from scratch. To introduce this new calibre, we needed a new collection.

The whole idea is to come up with something—I was talking about consistency—that is consistent with the previous collection. So the Trente-Deux is a new offer, but still very identifiable. It still is very Trilobe, somehow, with a very strong identity. You can recognise how it is deeply influenced by the Les Matinaux, which was our first collection.

It has this very strong Trilobe signature, yet it brings something different. An integrated bracelet has been a big question internally, whether we should or should not go with it. We thought, "A lot of clients buy bracelets, so it is good to bring that to our collection." But we wanted to make sure that we were coming up with a bracelet that has a very strong signature: very elegant, well-defined, refined in all the details, and comfortable. Since we managed to gather movement and brand identity with a very comfortable and elegant bracelet, the cards were kind of aligned, and it was good to introduce this new calibre into this collection.

THG: You did not take the easy route, for sure. The seven-part construction of the case itself goes way beyond what a conventional case is.

VOLCY: That is what we love to do. Again, we do things very seriously. We put all our heart and convictions into all those details. I think we were feeling proud of the achievement of this collection. It is consistent with everything we have done before, but a little bit more mature. Not a little bit more—quite mature. It is a big step. It has been a milestone for the brand, and I think this collection has been a game-changer for Trilobe. I can see it internationally from the media, from the distribution, and from the client's perspective. It is a game-changer for us.

VOLCY: Exactly. You have perfectly summarised it.

THG: Of course, talking about the watch, we cannot ignore the movement. You already mentioned the name means to start from scratch. Can you tell us how it is different from the previous movement, and what the major shifts in construction and philosophy are?

VOLCY: In terms of design, it has a very strong identity, a very strong signature look. Again, we strongly believe that to find a place in this very intense and creative market, we needed to come up with a movement which is as identifiable as the watch itself. So this movement has a very strong signature, an aesthetic DNA which really belongs to us. Some people would say it is a very French movement; I do not know, but it resembles us.

From a technical perspective, I would say it is an evolution and optimisation of eight years of learning processes. It is the same principle in terms of intellectual and mechanical construction, but we have taken all the learnings from the last seven years from our watchmakers, and from after-sales service anticipation as well, in order to improve even further. It is a natural evolution and optimisation of our X-Centric calibre.

The difference is that we used to have a micro-rotor movement, and now it has an oscillating mass, which gives more stability to the movement. It is a very pure movement, meaning it is very simple in terms of design, yet with all the codes of fine watchmaking when looking at the finishings. That is also what is important: it is really a movement which has a strong signature from 10 metres away, and when you look closer, it is extremely refined.

THG: I guess it is also a movement that is designed specifically for the power required for the rotating rings?

VOLCY: It looks very simple when you look at a watch like that, but it is a dual complication. First, you need to manage these rings rotating all day long counter-clockwise without any friction, without any tension, in a very smooth way. That is one thing.

The second thing is managing the energy of the movement, because the rings are much heavier than traditional hands. So managing to have a 48-hour power reserve despite the very high energy consumption from the rings has been a real technical challenge.

We managed to face these two challenges: energy consumption and rings rotating. The X-Nihilo calibre is our very first full in-house calibre —from design, conception, prototyping, manufacturing components, decorating, hand-finishing, assembling, and controlled in-house.

THG: Is there any attempt at trying to lower the weight of the rings?

VOLCY: We are at the minimum. A lot of clients are asking us to do stone dials, for example. But stone is very fragile, so you need to have slightly thicker dials. One day we will do it, but it will have an impact on the thickness. But, I think we have been up to the maximum of what we could do.

THG: Maybe one day some breakthrough will come and you can...

VOLCY: Oh, yes. Creativity, as I said, is really part of the DNA of the brand. I showed you that with the Le Temps Retrouvé as well, you know, this very special clock. We have internalised all the research and development in-house with our engineer, conceptor, and designers that work in Paris in our headquarters. Yes, we are working on some very exciting projects where we are not necessarily expected at all, you will see, but still remaining loyal to our concept. Full of surprises coming in the next years.

THG: Very exciting, very exciting. Coming back to the latest edition that you launched, the Château. Who is the bigger wine drinker between you and Gautier?

VOLCY: That is a difficult question. No, I think both of us enjoy it. It started as a joke internally. We say, "At Trilobe, we love to celebrate." It is important to celebrate milestones, success, and the brand's evolutions. We wanted to celebrate the one-year anniversary of our collection, and in France, to celebrate, you obviously have a glass of wine. So it started this way as an internal joke, and it ended up like that.

THG: And who is in charge of picking the wines?

VOLCY: Gautier loves gastronomy, so he loves doing that. We have done some internal selections that will surprise you; you will see. But only French wines. Apart from that, I think one thing which is important for us as well is that in France you have a lot of craftsmanship, a lot of know-how that is very specific to France. French wine, obviously, is part of it.

For us, it is important as well to pay tribute to all this different French know-how. We have a new showroom in Paris, really at the heart of—we moved three weeks ago—where we will put a strong emphasis on highlighting and helping our clients to discover a lot of different French craftsmanship, whether it is about gastronomy, pâtisserie, wine, art de la table, design, or fragrances. There are so many beautiful things that we love to share as well with our clients.

THG: Poetry, books...

VOLCY: Poetry, books, art, yes. A lot of things like that. We will create that full experience, a French experience, a Parisian experience.

THG: Hopefully one day I will be able to pay a visit again. That would be amazing.

VOLCY: You have to come back and visit us, exactly.