Category: Watch Talk

“The Monochrome Video Week” – MCT Watches, The Present and Future of an Independent Brand

You certainly know how much love we have here, at Monochrome Watches, for independent watchmaking and unconventional displays of the time. In this small but so creative field of the industry, one brand always intrigued us: MCT Watches and their unique prism-based timepieces. Denis Giguet and Pierre Jacques, the founder and the CEO of the brand, today the two men behind MCT Watches, explain the ins-and-outs behind running such a manufacture. They talk details about the specific, unique, hyper-creative display and mechanism behind a MCT Watch and share some ideas for the future of the brand. “The Monochrome Video Week” brings you in unusual territories, the underground side of watchmaking.

9 years ago

“The Monochrome Video Week” – URWERK, Celebrating 20 Years of Visionary Watchmaking

1997: Martin Frei and Felix Baumgartner launch Urwerk and their first model, the UR 101, freely inspired by the 17th century Campanus brothers’ night clock (one of the things you might not know about URWERK). 2016: the brand will soon celebrate its 20th anniversary. 20 year of unchained creations, of unusual display of the time, of bold and creative watchmaking, with however a great respect to traditions and haute-horlogerie (and again something that you might not know about the brand). Today is thus the perfect moment for us to sit down with Felix Baumgartner, co-founder of URWERK, and to see how this bold and unchained independent watchmaker started, how they found inspiration for their first creations and how the brand evolved over the years to become the great brand we know today.

9 years ago

“The Monochrome Video Week” – Montblanc, Hand Decoration At The Villeret Manufacture

As watch journalists, one of the most recurring questions we have is how a small wrist accessory (a.k.a a watch) can have a 5 or 6-digit price tag? And clearly, for those who are not entirely into watches, that’s an entirely justified question. In order to draw an answer to this highly complex and delicate question, we took Davide Cerrato, Managing Director of Montblanc Watch Division, apart for a properly interesting discussion. Davide will guide us inside the Montblanc Villeret Manufacture, the haute-horlogerie sanctuary of the brand, to discover the beauty of real hand-finishing as it’s executed by Montblanc’s watchmakers. Polishing, Anglages, Tourbillon… Let us bring you in this fascinating world of hand-decoration through a long, in-depth video.

9 years ago

Announcing “The Monochrome Video Week”

Starting today is the “Monochrome Video Week“, meaning that for the coming five days we will be showing recent, unpublished videos that we shot at location in Villeret, Neuchâtel and Geneva. On Friday we’ll show you some of our best-viewed videos, also filmed on location in Glashütte (Germany), and in Switzerland in Biel, Geneva and Villeret. Let’s make clear that we’re not showing you corporate videos of some of our favourite watches brands, nope, these are movies filmed in our own style, by our own crew, and of subject of our own choice. So, instead of showing you photos of watches or a visual description of a manufacture visit, we’re showing you everything in the best possible way; there’s no better ‘tool’ than movies to explore the fascinating world of fine watchmaking. Please sit down, get a big bag of popcorn… here’s what we have lined up for you for the “Monochrome Video Week“

9 years ago

Watch Around the World – #watw

Watch Around the World Recently, when we were in Vienna (Austria) during an event, we met up with a loyal reader of Fratello Watches. Let’s say his name is Markus, you’ll find him on Instagram as @vintagewatchzilla. Except being a Speedmaster and Speedy Tuesday fan, Markus had a very nice idea. Not long ago he […]

9 years ago

Just Because – A Barn Find Gallet Multichron Decimal

As it’s the weekend after Thanksgiving and most Americans are either exhausted from eating too much or from being dragged to the mall to fight the crowds (this idea of Black Friday is spreading around the globe by the way), we thought we’d lighten your spirits by giving you a mini #TBT “Just Because” about […]

9 years ago

Frederique Constant Analytics Clip – Real Time Analytics For Your Mechanical Watch

Watch geeks everywhere pay attention; there’s a cool new tool for the Frederique Constant Analytics app and its available just in time for Christmas! Simply called the Frederique Constant Analytics Clip, this device attaches to just about any mechanical watch and allows the user to measure its accuracy in real time using the brand’s SwissConnect Analytics App, available on iOS and Android. Best of all it costs less than your next service and allows you to keep track of the accuracy measurements over time on a dashboard. It’s pretty cool if we do say so ourselves.

9 years ago

GIVE AWAY – MCT Watches Leather Watch Roll (and there are 4 of them…)

As of now, you should know that we are celebrating this year our 10th anniversary. For this reason, we are organizing several give aways. After our latest contest, where you had the opportunity to win a Garrick Leather Watch Pouch, this week we have a new one for you, and not just for one of the participants, but 4 of you will have the opportunity to win a very cool MCT Watches Leather Watch Roll. MCT Watches is one of the main actors of the “indie” watchmakers, and this is why we also want your opinion about this rather special watchmaking universe.

9 years ago