VIDEO: A sketching class with one of the world’s greatest living watch designers, Fabrizio Buonamassa Stigliani of Bulgari
Most of us probably haven’t tried to draw anything since high school, and those high school drawings are unlikely to be works of art. Even to the encouraging eyes of our parents. But don’t worry, because it’s never too late to learn a new skill, especially when you’ve got the best teachers, and you’re learning about a subject you’re passionate about – a subject like watches. Earlier this year, Andrew McUtchen had the pleasure of speaking with Fabrizio Buonamassa Stigliani, the head watch designer at Bulgari and the man behind the Bulgari Octo Finissimo, and Fabrizio was generous enough to offer a quick lesson on how to sketch our own Bulgari Octo Finissimo drawing. That’s right, a five-minute lesson on how to draw one of the hottest up-and-coming sports watches of the last few decades, from the man who brought it to life. Like I said, when you’ve got the best teachers it’s easy to learn a new skill, and it’s safe to say that Fabrizio Buonamassa Stigliani is the best person for the job when it comes to sketching the Octo Finissimo. The Bulgari Octo Finissimo case shape in its current form was first released in 2014, housing a…
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There is an endless succession of fads, curiosities and sensations on social media. @horomariobro is not one of them. And if you need to stop now and follow him, we’ll forgive you. His extraordinary macro photography and videography, coupled with insightful commentary on what his lens has captured, has hit Instagram with the force of a revelation. When it comes to dropping the knowledge, Mr Mario speaks in frank layman’s terms that any fan can understand. Sometimes he’s awed. Sometimes he’s disappointed. But always, he’s interesting beyond belief. Every single post is a must-read. It’s not over the top to say he’s become a conscience for the industry, seeing through the hype to the #details that reveal which of your most revered brands are truly obsessive about perfection. Therefore, in a few short months, he has become legend. And he is in a company of one when it comes to posting eagle-eyed, truth telling vignettes that will make you feel differently about all kinds of brands. Want to know if your Grand Seiko polishes the underside of its hands? Want to watch ultra slo-mo of your flyback chrono returning to zero? @horomariobro is here to help. And sometimes, to harm the reputations of generally unimpeachable brands. Patek? Lange? Journe?…
The notion that “knowledge is power” has arguably become the guiding principle of our professional lives. Organisations are more reliant than ever on numerical evidence to gauge how they’re shaping up. Businesses study balance sheets, governments scrutinise trade figures, media networks analyse traffic growth and revenue streams. Sport, too, has become ever more data-obsessed after the so-called “Moneyball effect” saw the Oakland A’s baseball team thrive after they started basing their decisions on statistical analysis, rather than the hunches of ageing scouts. As a result, the corporate maxim, “If it’s not measurable, it’s not manageable” has become universally accepted. The reason is simple: numbers deliver an objective yardstick to determine your rate of progress or decline. That philosophy is now also becoming increasingly applied to our personal lives. Built on the promise of “self-knowledge through numbers”, the “quantified self” movement is based on collecting data on a specific area of your life with a long-term view to improving it. Your focus could be anything you’re looking to work on: weight loss, mood swings, cholesterol levels, productivity, too much booze … To the self-tracker they’re all made to measure. Once you’ve accumulated a reasonable wodge of data, you can then analyse…
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,…
“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…