Huygens

The Huygens clock brand is a Van Mokum brand. From the studio in Amsterdam, the Van Mokum team designs and develops beautiful and unique products. These are marketed under various brands such as Huygens, LEFF Amsterdam, and Graypants. Each brand represents a different style and has its own story. The Huygens brand, for example, takes its name from Christiaan Huygens, the inventor of the pendulum clock.

Huygens quality

All Huygens clocks are tested to meet high-quality standards and equipped with a silent movement. Your clock is designed in the Netherlands and made from recyclable quality materials. To make sure your Huygens clock is unique and authentic, all Huygens clocks are registered designs.

Christiaan Huygens

Christiaan Huygens (The Hague, April 14, 1629 - July 8, 1695) was a prominent Dutch mathematician, physicist, astronomer, inventor, and writer of early science fiction. He was one of the leading figures in seventeenth-century science. Huygens was born in 1629 in The Hague into a prosperous and distinguished family. His father, Constantijn Huygens was a diplomat, top advisor to the House of Orange, poet, and composer. Huygens studied law and mathematics in Leiden, among others with the stimulating mathematician Frans van Schooten. After two years, Huygens continued his studies together with his brother Lodewijk at the Breda College of Orange. It was intended that Christiaan would finish his law degree with a view to a diplomatic career, but mathematics appealed to him more.

A man of many talents

In mathematics, he was a pioneer of probability theory and a pioneer of differential and integral calculus. He contributed in many areas to physics: he was the first to formulate correct laws for elastic collision, and expressions for the period of the mathematical pendulum and centrifugal force in mechanics. He was also the first to explain light as a wave phenomenon with the Huygens-Fresnel Principle, which became the generally accepted optical theory from the nineteenth century and is now part of the understanding of the duality of waves and particles. He further explained noise phenomena with interference. Huygens contributed to astronomy by further developing the telescope and explaining the hitherto misunderstood appearance of Saturn as a planet with rings. He discovered the moon Titan near this planet. As an inventor, Huygens has, among other things, the pendulum clock, the principle of the steam engine, and a gunpowder engine to his name. Because of his speculations about extraterrestrial life, Huygens is also seen as an early science fiction author.