Think expensive watch: think Rolex. Which may explain why nobody has ever had their hand cut off for a Patek Philippe or a Breguet. It also explains why the Rolex stand at the Basel Fair was at least twice as big as any other. The importance of Rolex to the luxury watch industry may also be seen from the fact that eighty five percent of all the officially-certified chronometers made in Switzerland come from the Rolex manufactory.

At Basel this year Rolex celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of their most famous model, the GMT Master, by producing one with a green dial. This may suit a chic Sinn Fein politician but it left me unmoved. This conservatism could also be seen by the change which they have made to their Datejust watches. Only a horological anorak will notice that the date numerals are now painted like a roulette wheel with uneven numbers in red and even ones in black.

The only seriously significant new Rolex on show was the Prince, a bling rectangular model designed to compete with the popular Cartier tank models.

On the opposite side of the main exhibition alley was that other great name of the Swiss watch industry, Patek Philippe. Here two new watches were causing a stir among the aficionados of this most august establishment. At the top end of the scale was the Reference 5296, a gorgeous spit chronograph with only a single button to operate both mechanisms. At a price of roughly £180,000 and an annual production of ten examples, this will be an instant collector’s item. The other watch which made me salivate was the waterproof stainless steel Nautilus which now comes in a complicated version, complete with annual calendar and moon phase.

If Patek is on the summit of the industry, then Seiko from Japan must be around sea level. And yet even this company has now decided to enter the luxury market with its Spring Drive line which is mechanical and not quartz and uses an entirely new system for time regulation claimed to be accurate to within one second per day.

Far from the madding crowds around the Rolex and Patek palaces was a small booth tucked away near the cafeteria. Here was where the genuine watch groupies clustered to see if they could catch a glimpse of the most sought-after watchmaker in Switzerland. His name is Philippe Dufour and, together with his daughter and a single assistant, he produces maybe twelve watches a year from his tiny workshop near the French border. If you want to own a Dufour watch you follow this procedure.