Presenting the Black Tulip by Annelinde Dunselman:
New Independent Watchmaker, New Watch.
Independent watchmaker Annelinde Dunselman explains, “Fighting and chasing goodness is something that is in me. In my youth, I was a real fighter, both in sports and street fighting.” That sounds like someone with the determination to make their own watch. And someone I’d like to meet!
The Black Tulip from the Netherlands I am writing about here is not botanical, this Black Tulip by independent watchmaker Annelinde Dunselman is a hand crafted stainless steel wristwatch. The Black Tulip is also the title of an historical novel by Alexandre Dumas. Dunselman’s Black Tulip was one of my personal highlights from Watches and Wonders 2025.. In a world full of many new watch releases – and I’m sorry to say, too also many insignificant new pieces – the exceptional Black Tulip got my attention.
I had the pleasure to meet Annelinde Dunselman in the Hotel Angleterre down by the Lake in Geneva during Watches and Wonders. While driving to Switzerland, I made a short stop to eat and drink, and messaged “Hi, Annelinde, greetings from me, Thomas. I will be in Geneva for the next days. And I would love to see your work and your watch. Is it ok if I just drop by to meet you?” A few minutes later I received, “Dear Thomas, I am very happy to welcome you. You can just drop by. See you then! Annelinde.“ This 2-minute communication immediately lifted my spirts and I was curious to meet Annelinde to see her watch. I have met and visited most independent watchmakers in The Netherlands (there aren’t that many), and was excited to see the first watch from Dunselman Watchmaking – the Black Tulip. Whenever I travel to Geneva for the Watches and Wonders, Time to Watches, or Geneva Watchdays, I am always happy to also visit the small workshops makers, the artistic brands, the unknown companies, and the single person ateliers, to see their art, craft, micromechanical engineering,and simply talk to these people. Meeting Annelinde Dunselman meant that I would see a completely new watch I knew little about, from a watchmaker I hadn’t heard of before, from a country that is not home to many manufacturers and brands, and a meeting that was wonderfully easy to arrange within minutes. It doesn’t get much better than that.
The Black Tulip
The Black Tulip is a stainless steel watch with a beautifully hand crafted movement developed by Dunselman. It displays hours, minutes, and small seconds, plus a niche complication that you can’t easily see.
One of my favorite features is the zero-reset mechanism (like it is used for the A. Lange und Söhne Saxomat micro-rotor movement). When a movement has a zero-reset mechanism, it makes my heart happy. The name of Dunselman’s first watch, ‘Black Tulip,’ is both very Dutch and very appropriate as Black is the rarest tulip color.
The designed in-house manually wound caliber D202.5 movement has the rare and playful zero-reset mechanism. When you pull out the crown to set the time, the small seconds hand jumps to 12 o’clock and stops there – like a chronograph reset – until the crown is pushed in. The power reserve of the Black Tulip is huge: 100 hours.
The 38 mm diameter steel case of the watch feels, and is, relatively small, and therefore very comfortable and unobtrusive to wear. The bezel of the Black Tulip is fully decorated with Dunselman’s laser-engraved tulip logo, and I appreciated the attention to small details.
I asked Annelinde who helps her during the long process of making her own watch, because there will surely be many questions and problems occuring while making your first piece.
Dunselman replied, “Fellow watchmakers helped me, the inexhaustible source of knowledge of my technical draughtsman, but also meeting suppliers who were willing to go the extra mile for me, I experienced all that as a great support.
“My team (meaning suppliers – Annelinde works alone at present)now consists of people who are all willing to go the extra mile. And that’s because they too see how special this project is. It feels like an enormous support and richness to work together and experience this dedication I feel around me.”
So working independently doesn’t necessarily mean working alone.
Dunselman is a mechanical freak and she likes to collect stuff like watches, turntables, and radios. Before she went into watchmaking, she pursued studies and work in theatre and social sciences – could anything be further away from the craft of watchmaking? Dunselman started watchmaking relatively late. She graduated in watchmaking and goldsmithing at Vakschool Schoonhoven in the Netherlands and studied watch decoration. From 2019 to 2022, Dunselman worked at Grönefeld in Oldenzaal, and left to make her own watches under Dunselman Watchmaking, in Zwolle, the Netherlands. I asked Annelinde, “Was there ever a moment you wanted to quit, to stop, to resign?“ She replied, I never thought of quitting this project at all. It seriously never occurred to me. “I don’t know that from experience either, giving something up. I don’t think I’ve ever done that in my life. I am not easily scared or startled or played out. I always feel guts and challenges and courage. I faced many bumps, again and again and it certainly hasn’t been easy. But for me (quoting Ryan Holiday, The Obstacle Is the Way. I did experience a lot in these 2.5 years of working on the Black Tulip and that has always given me an even stronger will to be perfect.”
