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Stowa

Germany · Founded 1927

German family-heritage watchmaker founded in 1927 by Walter Storz in Hornberg im Kinzigtal (the name STOWA is a portmanteau of STOrz WAlter); relocated to Pforzheim, Baden-Wurttemberg in 1935 and built its own factory there in 1938, the same year it introduced the Bauhaus-influenced watches that form the basis of today's Antea line. From 1939 Stowa was one of five manufacturers (alongside A. Lange & Sohne, IWC, Laco, and Wempe) commissioned to build the 55mm B-Uhr Beobachtungsuhr (observation watch) for Luftwaffe pilots and navigators, including a famously scarce roughly-42-piece batch carrying the inner-hour-scale 'Baumuster B' (Type B) dial around 1940-41. The Pforzheim factory was destroyed in Allied bombing on 23 February 1945; production resumed afterward in Rheinfelden. Walter Storz led the firm until his death in 1974, succeeded by his son Werner Storz; watchmaker Jorg Schauer acquired Stowa in 1996, and from the early 2000s built its now-signature direct-to-consumer sales model (minimal dealer network, made-to-order configurator). On 1 July 2021 Stowa was acquired by Tempus Arte GmbH & Co. KG. Location flag: this brief specified Engelsbrand, Baden-Wurttemberg. That address (Gewerbepark 16, 75331 Engelsbrand) is corroborated by third-party listings and appears tied to the Schauer-era manufacture, but Stowa's own current imprint page (stowa.de/impressum, fetched directly) lists the registered legal seat as Munich (Tempus Arte GmbH & Co. KG) with a business office at Rastatter Str. 29, 75179 Pforzheim - Engelsbrand does not appear on the live imprint. Flagging as an unresolved discrepancy rather than asserting either address with confidence; both candidate locations are in Baden-Wurttemberg and neither conflicts with any other catalogued brand's town. Best known today for faithful reissues of its historic Flieger, Marine, and Antea lines, built mainly on Swiss Sellita ebauches (SW200/SW210) and hand-wound calibers (Unitas 6498-1, Peseux 7001).