Jean-Francois Garand was apprenticed in 1735 to Leopold Artaut. The apprenticeship was transferred to Richard Jarry who sponsored Garand when he was received master on 27 November 1748. Garand appears to have secured his future in the traditional way by marrying the widow of Jean-Francois Ravechet and taking over their shop on the pont Notre-Dame. This he named l’Observatoire and ran extremely successfully until his death in 1778. It is evident that he traded as a retailer as well as working on his own account as a number of boxes have survived struck with different makers’ marks (Formey, Blerzy, Le Bastier, Paul Robert among others) but with Garand’s name on the bezel.
