We asked the Longines VP of Marketing lots of questions about the new Spirit collection so you don't have to
The Longines Spirit release is a totally new collection this year, something that is already very exciting in and of itself, but also because it’s an entirely new chapter for the brand. Longines, just like many of the finest watchmakers in the world, slowly improve their watches over time and rarely release entirely new collections, making the launch of the Spirit collection something that deserves attention just for its rarity. But beyond this new step from the brand, the Spirit collection is a totally different offering from Longines for a number of reasons. I spoke with Matthieu Baumgartner, the VP of Marketing at Longines, about how this new collection is a first for Longines in a few ways, and where it fits into the brand moving forward, and I came away with six key points you need to know. 1. This is the first Longines collection that blurs the line between old and new “One of the key challenges behind this collection was blending heritage and contemporary. We wanted to have it distinct from the heritage segment statement of Longines, which is made of re-interpretations of milestones from the archives and the Museum of Longines. Spirit was a different project,…
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“Completely irrational”, “a horrible affliction”, “the disease” … that’s how Shark Tank investor Kevin O’Leary described his obsession with watch collecting in a Time+Tide interview (read it here). It’s easy to understand O’Leary’s ambivalence about his hobby. After all, viewed from a certain perspective, watch collecting doesn’t make an awful lot of sense. Watches are not only often wincingly expensive, they’re also functionally redundant in that you can always tell the time by glancing at your phone. The desire to collect multiple watches can therefore seem even more nonsensical. Particularly if you keep most of them stashed in a safe. So why do we devote so much time, effort and resources to such an illogical pursuit? Dr Richard Moulding is a clinical psychologist and senior lecturer at Deakin University and specialises in compulsive behaviour. He believes that timepieces are particularly desirable things to collect due to their multi-faceted nature. “People collect things they’re passionate about and get enjoyment from,” Dr Moulding says. “Watches tick a lot of boxes in terms of collectibles. There’s the technological side in terms of their movements, the different finishes and the advancements in precision. But watches are also aesthetic objects – some look better than…
If you haven’t heard of James Thompson, aka Black Badger, you’ve probably seen his brightly lit work online. He’s done collaborations with independent watchmakers such as MB&F, De Bethune, and Sarpaneva, and has more recently been working with the King of Customisation himself, George Bamford. While much of what Black Badger is known for is his impressive work with different luminous materials, lighting up jewellery and watches like you’ve never seen before, his work with the Bamford Watch Department has seen a slight departure from these illuminated beginnings, focusing instead on exotic materials. In his first collection with Bamford they used fordite for the dial, a material that is essentially a buildup of layers of industrial paint on the floors of car manufacturers. These psychedelically swirling dials are all unique and handmade by James in his workshop. The most recent collaboration between Black Badger and Bamford is the ambitious BWD X Badgerworks TAG Heuer Carrera Calibre 5 and features a dial made out of ground coffee beans. That’s right, the coffee. Black Badger credits his design school training for his ability to consider materials that those in the watch industry might overlook, and the results speak for themselves. While not…
The Rolex brand is older than the city of Canberra, a fact that shows not only Australia’s youth, but, by contrast, just how old watchmaking really is. It also surely makes Canberra one of the least likely places on earth to find someone in their mid-20s making a tourbillon pocket watch. Enter Reuben Schoots … Hidden away in his workshop, Schoots is working on a project that has likely never been attempted before in Australia. He is creating a pocket watch following the George Daniels method. That means entirely by hand. His prediction is that the watch will take around 3000 hours to complete, a pace that probably outstrips the bureaucratic processes of the nearby Parliament House. What is most interesting about this likely to be first-of-its-kind mission is that it is being undertaken by a 26-year-old who seems to possess the patience of a Stoic philosopher. He has been interested in mechanics since a young age, helping his dad with the restoration of a 1961 Triumph TR4 when he was just eight. While there are obvious similarities between vintage cars and vintage watches, it was almost by accident that Schoots was introduced to horology. “I travelled to South America…
“It’s completely irrational. It’s a horrible affliction,” says Kevin O’Leary. “Once you’re infected, you have to deal with it. You have to live with the disease.” Just like that, the Shark Tank personality confirms he isn’t just another rich guy with a bunch of rich-guy watches. He is one of us. He has fallen, quickly, and with unstoppable momentum, down the horological rabbit hole we call home. While that metaphor — of watch collecting being akin to an infection, a disease — now takes on a different spin in these COVID-19 days, it is still the only one that works for just how deeply watches can invade the psyche. Where did Kevin O’Leary come from and how did he make his money? Kevin was born in Canada, but was an incredibly well-travelled child thanks to his step-father working at the United Nations. “Cambodia, Ethiopia, Cyprus, Switzerland, France, Germany, Japan,” he said, listing a few of the places he lived as a child. “Because the United Nations has offices in Geneva, at a very early age I was spending a lot of time in Switzerland and my step-father got me into two passions. One was wine and the other was watches.”…
The worst brand associations feel like they’ve been hatched in drunken brainstorms at the end of a very long day. There seems zero reason to attach the celebrity to the product, beyond a marketing budget that urgently needs to be spent. Thankfully, TAG Heuer’s decision to partner up with Kyle Chalmers isn’t like that at all. In fact, it seems less like a marketing decision than intuitive common sense. Think about it, for a second. You’ve got a watch called the Aquaracer, so it’s logical you buddy up with an Olympic gold-winning swimmer. And that’s exactly what TAG Heuer have done with today’s news that Kyle Chalmers has become a “friend of the brand”. Chalmers stunned the world at Rio 2016 when he seemed to come out of nowhere to win the 100m Freestyle as a fresh-faced 18-year-old. Four years on, he’s now got his eyes fixed on this year’s Tokyo Games and the chance to consolidate his legacy as an Australian Olympic hero. TIME+TIDE: As an Olympic swimmer, it’s not just a question of every second counts, it’s every 100th of a second. Are you constantly aware of the clock in the pool? KYLE CHALMERS: Obviously, swimming is a…
Rado are well known for their collaborations with important designers from around the world. Famous names who have designed watches for Rado include English product designer Jasper Morrison, Taiwanese graphic designer Leslie Chan, and more recently the renowned Welsh furniture designer Bethan Gray. The Rado True Thinline Studs Limited Edition is a meeting of Rado’s expertise in high-tech ceramic as a case material, and Bethan’s interest in traditional craft, and how she can tell that story through design. I was fortunate enough to sit down with Bethan to discuss the drivers of her design process and what it was like designing a watch with Rado. If you haven’t come across Bethan’s work before, it is informed by her interests as a passionate traveller and storyteller and her fascination with traditional craft techniques from around the world. She was born in Wales to a Welsh mother and a Scottish father, but her ancestors hail from much further afield, descending from a nomadic Rajasthani clan that migrated across the Middle East. This desire to explore the world has taken Bethan everywhere from China to Oman, two locations that heavily influenced the final design of her project with Rado. One of her favourite techniques…
Harry Fane is one of the world’s foremost experts in Cartier, not just watches but the entire gamut of objets d’art that have been produced by the brand for more than 150 years. He cites his specific interest in the brand as being the golden age of the luxury maison from a creative standpoint, regarded as falling between 1919 and 1939, when some of the most important designs from the brand were developed. One of the reasons for Mr Fane’s fascination? A part of it boils down to the ambition to make the quotidian more beautiful. “Cartier had a great interest in making jewelled objects: Louis Cartier’s idea was to make a jewel into a utilitarian object and a utilitarian object into a jewel.” In an interview with the well-regarded vintage dealer A Collected Man, Harry Fane discusses his obsession with the manufacturer, and why his enthusiasm has failed to wane. Beyond his palpable passion for Cartier, Mr Fane’s comments are also peppered with fascinating facts about the brand, such as there being only 1803 Tank watches made by Cartier Paris between 1919 and 1960. You can read the full interview right here.
Everyone’s first Rolex purchase is important — it’s a milestone that, for most, carries with it a great amount of pride and sense of accomplishment. And for almost all of us out there lucky enough to have bought their inaugural timepiece from the legacy watchmaker, it isn’t something that was entered into lightly; we have known for ages before the purchase which exact model we were going to buy. However, Joseph’s first Rolex purchase was … somewhat anomalous, shall we say. Rolex, I guess, is a staple in every collector’s stable. As for me, for as long as I can remember, I have been aware of the prestige the brand commands. The interesting part, though, is that I never liked them. And when I say them, I mean their “sports watches” (before y’all hyperventilate with the insane ridiculousness of this statement, you gotta realise that to me, uniqueness of a watch as a complete product — so dial, straps, lugs, pretty much everything visual about a watch — is what makes collecting interesting). This particular Rolex, a simple Oyster Perpetual 36, is something that I saw in a window display while passing by. I am sure other watch enthusiasts would agree, it was…
Science is very boring. For most people at least, and Michael Biercuk, who works as a quantum physicist, is far from most people. In fact, the phrase “Only boring people get bored” goes a long way to explaining why (if you follow the syllogism) Michael is deeply interested in a highly technical area that causes the eyes of most to glaze over, because he is also deeply interesting. I met with him at Dubai Watch Week, where he was a speaker at the event, and was fortunate enough to sit down with him and find out about his work as Professor of Quantum Physics and Quantum Technology at the University of Sydney, as well as being the CEO and founder of a quantum technology start-up called Q-CTRL. At the university, Michael is responsible for a research team who build quantum computers. “We build this next generation of computational machine that uses the physics we find inside very small things in order to process information in a totally new way,” he said patiently, clearly having explained his job more than once to people who are better with words than numbers. In a similar vein, his company Q-CTRL “specializes in making quantum…