Top Marques Monaco 2026 : The Sound of History

From a 230-year-old Dutch bell-founding dynasty to the pinnacle of haute horlogerie, Van Bergen 1795 debuts its groundbreaking Heero Collection at Top Marques Monaco, under the high patronage of H.S.H. Prince Albert II of Monaco.

There is a bell in Arlington National Cemetery whose voice was shaped by Dutch hands. Cast in Heiligerlee, in the flat, wide lands of Groningen, it was a gift from Queen Juliana of the Netherlands to President Truman in 1952 — a sovereign gesture carried by six generations of acoustic mastery. For two centuries, the Van Bergen family shaped bronze into sound that rang from cathedral towers across four continents. That same mastery, that same obsession with tonal precision, now finds its ultimate expression in an altogether different instrument. This time, on the wrist.

A Dynasty Built in Bronze

Van Bergen 1795 traces its origins to a single act of craftsmanship. In 1795, Andries Heeres I recast the church bell of Midwolda, a small village in the northeastern Netherlands. It was not a grand commission; it was a beginning. From that first casting, a dynasty was born – one that would, across six generations and over two centuries, supply bells to cathedrals, palaces, and institutions across Europe and America. At the World Fairs of Vienna, London, Philadelphia, Paris, Amsterdam, and Antwerp, Van Bergen took medal after medal, establishing a standard of tonal precision that made their name synonymous with the carillon art.

The 1955 Rockefeller commission stands as the most celebrated chapter: 58 bells for the Riverside Church in New York, creating the world’s largest carillon. It was a commission entrusted to artisans whose understanding of harmonic resonance had been refined through generations of listening, tuning, and casting. Not theory. Inheritance.

Then, in April 1980, Van Bergen cast its last bell. Not an ending – a transformation. The family maintained careful stewardship of the heritage and the acoustic legacy. The knowledge did not disperse. It waited for the question worthy of it.

From Foundry to Atelier

The idea that the Van Bergen acoustic legacy could be translated into watchmaking came not from a business plan but from a question: what complication could be worthy of that heritage? The answer arrived with the same logic that had always governed the foundry’s craft. Not decoration. Sound.

Baron Dr. h.c. R.A.U. Juchter van Bergen Quast, seventh-generation direct descendant of the founding dynasty and President of Van Bergen 1795, joined forces with CEO Erik Meijer, classically trained as a percussionist at the Rotterdam and The Hague conservatories, and a veteran of over two decades in luxury horology. Together they approached the challenge with the same principle that had governed every bell ever cast under the Van Bergen name: tonal intention must precede mechanical execution, never the other way around.

Master watchmaker Daniel van Ree, Chief Technical Officer and specialist in rare and exclusive complications, completed the founding team. The engineering challenge they set themselves was, in modern horology, without precedent. The world-record gong sits at the back of the watch, commanding its own architectural space. The sonnerie mechanism occupies the layer directly behind the dial. Between them, with no room to negotiate, the entire timekeeping calibre had to exist: a complete manufacture movement, wound and regulated, compressed into a mere 2.5 millimetres. Not a movement that accommodates a gong. A movement that earns its place between two acoustic absolutes. Van Bergen did not build a watch and add sound to it. They built sound and found the thinnest possible heartbeat to sustain it. As it always had been, the voice came first.

“A Van Bergen without sound would be a Van Bergen without soul. Our founders shaped bronze into music; we shape movements into melody.” Erik Meijer, CEO – Van Bergen 1795

The Heero Collection: A Striking Complication Born of Bell-Founding Heritage

The result is the Heero Collection – an inaugural expression limited to 230 numbered pieces, one for each year of the Van Bergen heritage. The name honours Heero Andries van Bergen, the dynasty’s eighteenth-century ancestor whose mathematical grids for shipbuilding, combined with his son’s bell-casting calculations inspired the watch’s signature checkerboard dial pattern. 

The Heero carries a half-hour sonnerie au passage – a striking complication that chimes automatically at each half-hour, without the wearer’s intervention. It is a horological rarity: a complication historically confined to the most rarefied tier of Swiss watchmaking, offered here at €29,000 excluding VAT. 

The case and bracelet are machined from aerospace-grade titanium Grade-5, 41 mm in diameter, water-resistant to 30 metres, running at 5 Hz (36,000 A/h). The world-record gong is visible through the sapphire caseback. The dial is offered in five colour variants. Every piece is individually numbered and will be delivered by 31 December 2026. 

Monaco: The Only Fitting Stage

Van Bergen 1795 could have chosen Geneva. They could have chosen Basel. They chose Monaco – and the choice was not strategic. It was inevitable.

The brand carries six generations of service to European royalty. Princess Juliana attended the 1933 dedication of the first Dutch tuned carillon in two centuries. Van Bergen bells ring today at Arlington National Cemetery as a sovereign gift between nations. A brand with this history does not debut in a convention hall. It debuts under royal patronage.

The world premiere takes place at Top Marques Monaco 2026, where H.S.H. Prince Albert II of Monaco will receive a bespoke timepiece exclusively designed in close coordination with the Palais Princier. It is a unique creation for a reigning sovereign, and a gesture that no watch brand in modern history has made at its launch.

Accompanying the world premiere is the Monaco Special Edition: 59 pieces in total. Fifty are crafted in titanium Grade-5 at €32,500 excluding VAT; nine in 18ct white gold, priced on request. The Monaco-inspired dial distinguishes this edition from the standard Heero, while the movement architecture – 2.5 mm calibre, world-record gong, half-hour sonnerie at 5 Hz – remains identical. Two editions. One soul.

Purpose Built into Rarity

Fifteen percent of all Monaco Edition net proceeds will be donated to The Princess Charlene of Monaco Foundation, an organisation committed to building a world where children from all backgrounds can thrive in a safe environment and learn to live together. Van Bergen 1795 is also presenting the Foundation with a Piece Unique – a one-of-a-kind timepiece created exclusively for the occasion which will be auctioned later in 2026, with the entirety of the proceeds going directly to the Foundation’s work. 

The choice reflects the dual character of the brand: a commitment to rarity and excellence that does not exist in isolation from the world it inhabits. It is a principle entirely consistent with Van Bergen’s history. The foundry that supplied bells to cathedrals and gifted carillons to nations understood that craft, at its highest expression, carries public meaning. That understanding has not been left in Heiligerlee. It has been wound into every movement.

“Between the three of us lies everything Van Bergen needs: the name, the vision, and the craft. We did not build this brand. We inherited the right to carry it forward.” The Founders – Van Bergen 1795