HANDS ON: The Christopher Ward C1 Worldglow is redefining the dress watch with some serious playfulness
At a time when there is limited opportunity for travellers to jet around the world, there is a perverse brilliance in the timing of the British designed, Swiss-made Christopher Ward C1 Worldglow – a source of much-needed light at the end of the tunnel, and that’s before we even mention the lume factor. The genesis of Christopher Ward’s latest brainchild comes from its sister watch, the C1 Moonglow, which landed in July 2019. That was released to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the landing of the first Apollo that landed on the moon and was a roaring success for the British brand that only formed in 2005 (from a chicken shed in Berkshire I might add). It is now one of several brands driving a burgeoning UK market forward, thanks in part to co-founder and CEO Mike France (no, he’s not French). “Building on the success of the C1 Moonglow, we are out to establish an even stronger foothold and put our own flag, if you like, into glow watches that are part of the dress category,” France tells us. “Nobody’s really ever done anything in terms of lume on dress watches. But we thought, ‘How do you spark something…
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Forget Swiss neutrality, Moser are not a brand afraid to court controversy. This was made abundantly clear in January 2016, when they revealed a new watch in response to the launch of the Apple Watch from the previous year. The Moser Swiss Alp Watch was born as a satirical take on the watch industry’s mad rush to make connected watches. It borrowed distinct visual cues from Jony Ive’s Apple Watch with its round-edged rectangular case but housed one of Moser’s in-house mechanical movements rather than any touch-screen tech. Now the brand introduces the last chapter in this delightfully subversive exercise in the form of the all new Moser Swiss Alp Watch Final Upgrade. When first launched in a 50 piece limited edition in 2016, Moser were bullish about the need for a proactive response to the smartwatch’s inroads into the industry. In their original press release for the Swiss Alp Watch launch they pulled no punches. “As the challenge of the smartwatch emerged, it threw Swiss watchmaking into turmoil. However, the complete lack of a response from most market players is remarkable in itself. Doing nothing and waiting for the threat to pass is certainly a dangerous course, but it…
The Rolex Explorer ref. 214270 is considered the Rolex model for true watch enthusiasts, or enthusiasts of the brand. By no means basic in the millennial sense of the word, the Explorer is less attention grabbing with its boiled-down to the essentials design. While less iconic to mainstream consumers than say the Submariner or Daytona, the Explorer watch presents owners with an all-in-one package extremely versatile in wear. It can be worn with formal attire, without raising a debate if sport watches should be paired with a suit, or be right at home on the wrist while summiting a mountain. The sole survivor of the line, the Rolex Explorer ref. 214270, is the brand’s most robust and modern take on the watch – delivering a blend of classic and current aesthetics and technologies. Rolex Explorer ref. 214270 price and availability: The Rolex Explorer ref. 214270 has an RRP of $9150 AUD and is currently available, though you may need to wait on a waitlist. For more details, visit Bob’s Watches right here. Made in partnership with Bob’s Watches. However, the opinions expressed in this article are our own in accordance with our Editorial Policy.
The Piaget Polo was first introduced in 1979, inspired by the jet-setting lifestyle and where luxury met sport. Its release coincided with Piaget becoming a sponsor for Polo tournaments around the world. Yves Piaget personally loved to attend these events, their glamour, sport, and spontaneity inspiring the Polo watch design. The Piaget Polo watch has changed a great deal since its release over 4 decades ago, the 2016 Piaget Polo S bringing the watch into a more price approachable metal and modern format. It was a tad controversial at the time, with some drawing comparisons to the integrated designs of Audemars Piguet and Patek Philippe. Regardless of where you stand in that conversation, today the collection introduces a watch irrefutably tied to Piaget’s identity: the Piaget Polo Skeleton. When discussing the art of ultra-thin watchmaking, Piaget is invariably part of the conversation. Other manufacturers produce super thin watches, sure, but the pursuit for the ultimate in thin ultra-thin watchmaking is a core component of Piaget’s heritage. In 1957, Piaget introduced their renowned ultra thin caliber 9P which was only 2mm thick. Three years later, they introduced the 12P movement – the world’s thinnest self winding movement at the time with…
The term “luxury sports watch” is often an overused clichè. But the Louis Vuitton Tambour Damier Graphite Race Chronograph leaves you in no doubt of its intentions. A bold case combined with serious swagger and eye-popping green accents makes it a bright spark of contemporary design in a world of homage watches. Shy it ain’t. This watch is neither small nor particularly quiet, but maybe it’s exactly what we need? Not everyone wants a softly spoken 38mm skindiver, and this is nothing of the sort. The first time I lay my hands on it I notice that in this rather large 46mm case, LV has managed to create a very comfortable wearing sports chronograph. The round Tambour case is a veritable silky smooth pebble of comfort in black PVD-treated smooth steel. It sits just-so on the wrist and gives you a perfectly rounded background, while distracting you through the lively use of B.R.I.G.H.T green accents. The feeling on the wrist is sublime with the black and green logoed rubber strap, temptingly quick-released from the slender, downturned lugs can be swapped perhaps to an alligator strap for that Saturday night cocktail party. Though you’ll probably want to keep it on as…
Chamath Palihapitiya is a name you might not have heard of a week ago but, thanks to his very public support of the GameStop share trading controversy, it’s now significantly more recognisable. He began his career as an early senior executive at Facebook, before beginning his current venture as the billionaire founder of Social Capital, a venture capital firm established to “advance humanity by solving the world’s hardest problems”. If that wasn’t enough to be getting on with, Palihapitiya is also a part owner of the Golden State Warriors basketball team. But as his wrist game clearly demonstrates, the man knows his horological hardware too. Audemars Piguet Royal Oak Double Balance Wheel Open Worked Rose Gold 41mm When you enter the world of Audemars Piguet, it makes sense to start with the Royal Oak family. Maybe something time-only in steel or a more technical option if you’re attracted to the Off Shore arm of the collection. A reference that certainly isn’t your entry point to the brand is the Audemars Piguet Royal Oak Double Balance Wheel Open Worked Rose Gold 41mm, a skeletonised tour de force hewn from a very attractive shade of precious metal. Palihapitiya was spotted wearing this…
Watch manufacturers usually get it right when it comes to their factory configurations. But people’s tastes vary a lot. Sometimes you might feel a design could use a touch more flair or may even need to be scaled back a bit. Buyers normally have to rely on their imaginations to play dress up with their strap monsters, often buying straps online and hoping when they arrive they live up to whatever they’d pictured in their mind. But Hublot is making this experience easier and a whole lot more fun. Through their Hublot Strap Customiser Tool, visitors to the Hublot site can now play watch designer and, if they like what they see, even purchase the configuration for themselves. I decided to try it out for myself, and here are three configurations I think really work (or at least make a great second option to the original configuration). Hublot Classic Fusion Titanium ref. 542.NX.1171.RX The Hublot Classic Fusion Titanium ref. 542.NX.1171.RX is 42mm in diameter, 50 metres water-resistant and runs on the HUB1110 self-winding movement with 42 hours of power reserve. The Classic Fusion is a nice daily wearer that works well for both casual and formal settings. It comes on…
Fast-forward 30 years into the future. You’re being chauffeured by your robot valet in your flying car on a trip to buy another pair of underpants made from laser-beam holograms (you’re not entirely convinced by them, but your cyborg wife thinks they look sexy). But when you glance at the watch on your wrist – yes, you will still be wearing one – what will it look like? Going by the vast bulk of watch releases over the last decade, the answer to that question is probably not that different. Not only does watch design move at a truly glacial pace, but vintage reissues and throwback homages have become ever more prevalent. In fact, if you try to think of a truly contemporary mechanical watch then it’s surprisingly hard. I was reminded of this fact recently speaking to Bani McSpedden, the venerable Watch Editor of The Australian Financial Review. “Nostalgia has been increasingly keeping the traditional watch industry alive,” he pointed out. “If you took away nostalgia, there are not a lot of people making a thoroughly modern product.” Bani conceded that some brands – Rolex and Omega, for example – remain tremendously progressive in terms of their horological engineering…
It was way back in 1969 that the first-ever gold Omega Speedmaster rolled off the production line, made for one wrist in particular – that of Richard Nixon. The caseback was engraved to read: RICHARD M. NIXON – PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES – “to mark man’s conquest of space with time, through time, on time”, and was to be a marker of the success that NASA had enjoyed throughout the 1960s. Unsurprisingly, public officials can’t accept gold watches from private companies, and the watch has sat in the Omega Museum ever since, offering a pristine reference for all of the gold Omega Speedmasters that have followed, including the latest Sedna gold Omega Speedmaster Moonwatch Professional Co-Axial Master Chronometer Chronograph 42mm. There have only been a relative handful of gold Speedies produced over the years, including the yellow gold Apollo XI from 1980, the white gold Apollo XI 25th edition released in 1994 and more recently the Moonshine gold Apollo 11 50th Anniversary Limited Edition from 2019. This makes any gold Speedmaster a pretty exciting release, but what makes the 2021 precious metal release particularly enticing is that it is not a limited edition watch (for the first time since…
Melbourne isn’t known as a hotbed of horological activity. Indeed, Patek Philippe was founded more than a decade earlier than Melbourne was even recognised as a city. But that hasn’t stopped Melbourne watchmaker John Robert Wristwatches announcing their Archetype collection this week that’s inspired by the dress watches of the 1950s and 60s only with a few modern tricks up its sleeve. As the city is twice as close to Antarctica as it is to Geneva, you might think it’d lack the technical chops you’re used to seeing from well-made Swiss or Japanese watches. But the John Robert Wristwatches Archetype collection proves that the tyranny of distance is a challenge that can definitely be overcome. The case The John Robert Wristwatches Archetype collection offers six different references in total, with an automatic movement or a High Accuracy Quartz (HAQ) caliber all featuring the choice of blue, white or charcoal dials. True to their mid-century inspiration, the 316L stainless steel cases measure 38mm in diameter, with a practical 20mm lug width. While not examples of ultra-thin watchmaking, the cases are also kept slender with the automatic references measuring 12.4mm thick, while the HAQ sits just 11.4mm thick. All of the watches…