A. Lange & Söhne is a company that has been around since the 1800s. Ferdinand A. Lange was born in Dresden, Germany in 1815. Fifteen years later, he began an apprenticeship with Saxon clockmaker J.C.F. Gutkaes starting his career in watchmaking. In 1837, Ferdinand A. Lange moved near Paris and worked as a foreman in a prominent horological manufactory, operated by Austrian clockmaker Joseph Thaddäus Winnerl —1799-1836, a pupil of Abraham Louis Breguet.