SEVERIN WUNDERMAN coveted a watch when he was 19 years old - the Corum Classic made with a sliced up US$20 dollar gold coin sandwiching a Swiss movement. The watch cost US$9,000 then - about $8,500 more than he could afford.
When he got older, he became a friend and protege of Aldo Gucci, ran the Gucci watch division for 29 years, and helped build it up into a US$550 million business.
When he made his fortune in 1999 when Gucci bought back the watchmaking licences, he promptly bought his Corum - not just his all-time favourite timepiece but the whole company.
At the time the young watchmaking company, set up in 1954, was struggling to make ends meet by creating complicated Admiral watches in limited quantities. Mr Wunderman turned things around by introducing the unconventional bubble series, featuring a solid spherical sapphire crystal that magnifies the dial.
The bubbles were produced en masse - 40,000 a year - and helped to pay the bills and continue to finance Mr Wunderman's penchant for manufacturing the limited Admiral Cups.
'Corum is a perfect match for me,' he said. 'It always does things differently. It always goes against the norm. Nobody makes an Admiral watch any more because it's very time-consuming. It takes 92 hours to make the dial alone. If one part is missing, you have to start over again.
'I enjoy making those 50 limited editions of Admiral watches, rather than making a million models for Gucci, because every single one is unique.'