Certainly, EUR 5K or more will buy you superlative finishing, innovation, modern materials, superior precision… And status. Luxury watchmaking doesn’t come cheap – most of the time for obvious reasons – but that doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy the desirable ticking sound of a mechanical watch with a much tighter budget. In fact, there are […]
Watches are no longer the robust tools we use in everyday life. We tell the time with our phones, and watches instead have taken on a much more important role as communicating something about ourselves. In spite of this, some watch companies continue to invest heavily in a traditional form of watchmaking where innovation is front of mind as the industry develops. Here are some of those manufacturers, offering us a few of the most innovative watches of 2019. VACHERON CONSTANTIN TRADITIONNELLE TWIN BEAT PERPETUAL CALENDAR Vacheron Constantin released the Traditionnelle Twin Beat Perpetual Calendar to great acclaim. It is technically remarkable, with its adjustable-frequency movement that can be tailored to individual lifestyles and demands. It is also aesthetically avant-garde, adding contemporary swagger to counterbalance classicism. Ref No: 3200T/000P-B578 . Case size: 42mm. Case material: Platinum. Movement: Calibre 3610 QP. Price: POA BULGARI OCTO ROMA GRANDE SONNERIE PERPETUAL CALENDAR Bulgari reaffirms its status as among the heaviest of hitters in the haute horlogerie arena with the deadset extraordinary Bulgari Octo Roma Grande Sonnerie Perpetual Calendar in Carbon CTP, a material chosen for its acoustic qualities. This 44mm machine contains 1180 components and a host of complications, including a minute repeater,…
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Zenith really wowed the global watch community last year with some truly impressive new releases that encompassed beautiful heritage pieces, new case materials and horological innovations that had everyone talking. We’d like to mention all the models that dropped last year, but, to keep it short and sweet, here were the three most important Zenith watches of 2019. ZENITH DEFY INVENTOR Before you ask, Aeronith is not a knock-off cover band honouring Steve Tyler and co. It is a futuristic aluminium foam impregnated with a stabilising polymer. The result is a cratered, ultra-light material that is as visual stunning as it is robust. The Defy Inventor uses this material for the bezel, perfectly framing the movement, which is the main draw: Caliber ZO 9100 runs at 18Hz, or, in layman’s terms, 129,600vph. That kind of frequency was once thought impossible. Ref No: 95.9001.9100/78.R584 / Case size: 44mm / Case material: Steel and Aeronith / Movement: ZO 9100 / Price: $26,200 ZENITH EP A384 REVIVAL The EP A384 Revival was one of Zenith’s most hotly anticipated drops of 2019. In a year ripe with celebrations dedicated to the El Primero’s half-century, it makes perfect sense to launch modern incarnations of the…
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Either these are some great stories, or it’s the CIA controlling our minds. You decide.
This will create a debate, no doubt about that… Every “petrolhead” will have his own opinion to the question: “What is the ultimate modern supercar?” There are multiple names that could be quoted here, such as the Ferrari F40, the Countach, the Veyron and many more of them that have a special place in the […]
Since the Rolex lineup is peppered with all-stars, like the perennially popular Submariner, crowd favourite GMT-Master II and boy-racer Daytona, it would be easy to overlook the basic Oyster Perpetual as simply filler for the (nowadays usually empty) display case. After spending a week with the new-for-2018 white dial variant, I advise you not to write it off because what we have here is a time-only watch that punches well above its weight class. The formula Consumers are generally trained to think that quality increases proportionally with cost and this can be true with a lot of goods and services in our world. At its retail price, the Oyster Perpetual 39 is one of the least expensive mainstream Rolex models, yet there is no discernible difference in the way it has been constructed relative to, say, a Day-Date. Yes, the Day-Date is made of hefty gold, but aside from the materials and weight, the Oyster Perpetual 39 and Day-Date make it very clear they come from the same factory with the same manufacturing principles. As its name suggests, this watch is 39mm in size which many people now consider to be “just right” in terms of a comfortable fit and…
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Editor’s note: With all the action of the Australian Open now well and truly underway, and following on from news that Seiko and tennis ace Novak Djokovic have just unveiled their latest limited edition timepiece, we thought we’d take another look at their 2019 collaborative special – the Seiko Astron Novak Djokovic Limited Edition SSE174J. Tennis great Novak Djokovic and Japanese watch manufacturer Seiko began their (doubles) partnership at the beginning of 2014. Just a few months later, Djokovic regained his position as world number one – a ranking he then held for 28 months straight. Coincidence? Perhaps, but whether it’s causation or correlation, the fact remains that the partnership has been an exceptional one for all involved. Especially us, with Seiko releasing a slew of stellar limited editions that celebrate the tennis legend’s achievements over the years since. The latest ace to be rocketed over the net is Seiko’s brand-new Astron SSE174J, and keen-eyed tennis and watch fans may have already spotted it on the champion’s wrist this year, as the comeback kid lifted his trophies and achieved the impossible by clawing his way back from a ranking low of world No. 22 in May to ending the season as world…
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You’ll be familiar with the misadventures of Spinal Tap over their 1982 album, Smell The Glove. The original cover artwork is problematic. Featuring the image of “a greased, naked woman on all fours wearing a dog collar”, the cover is knocked back by retailers who flatly refuse to display such a sexist image. Without the band’s knowledge, an alternative is secretly arranged by the record company. When the heavy metal album is eventually released, it comes with a cover that is completely black. In the film, as guitarist Nigel Tufnel evaluates the new record sleeve, he utters the legendary line: “It’s like, ‘How much more black could this be?’ And the answer is ‘None. None more black’.” But it turns out that you can, in fact, push further into the darkside. Moser proved it with the Endeavour Perpetual Moon Concept Vantablack. Vantablack is officially the blackest material known to man. Developed in 2014 by a UK company called Surrey NanoSystems, technically it isn’t a colour but a molecular trap for light. Consisting of vertically aligned carbon nanotubes, it was designed to be used in space telescopes, heat absorption, military applications and architecture. But on a watch dial it does something else…
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Porsche Design, with manufacturing under its own roof, is building a new future for its timepiece collections.
Junghans, the German watch company with a flair for minimalist watches that embrace the modernist tenets of Bauhaus design, expands its popular Max Bill collection with a chronograph and two three-hand watches in simple black and white. Two German Institutions Junghans, the famous German watch company, was founded in 1861 by Erhard Junghans in Schramberg […]