The Watch Gallery Magazine by Laura Finnegan

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HE WEARS: DAYTONA BY ROLEX (£7,950) SHE WEARS: OYSTER PERPETUAL DAY-DATE BY ROLEX (£15,800)

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EDITOR’S LETTER

WELCOME It gives me great pleasure to introduce the inaugural magazine from The Watch Gallery. If you haven’t already heard of The Watch Gallery then (hopefully) you’ll have a far better idea by the time you’ve reached page 64. For, as the name implies, it’s all about watches. As the name also implies, it’s about showcasing and admiring these watches in a beautiful environment – an environment in keeping with the craftsmanship and soul that goes into Switzerland’s finer timepieces.

“Thanks to innovative retailers like The Watch Gallery, watchmaking has never been so relevant”

Outside of these pages, that environment consists of a select few retail outlets in London and Manchester, which you may already be familiar with. The Rolex boutique at One Hyde Park (Europe’s finest, we like to think), the spectacular halls of Selfridges’ Wonder Room on Oxford Street, plus The Watch Gallery’s three own-branded stores in Westfield London, Chelsea and Selfridges Manchester. And there’s the website too of course, fully transactional and riddled with fascinating, editorial nuggets of its own.

individual watch resembles a tiny gallery in itself. Within this inch-wide circle of metal you’ll find the fruits of some 35 crafts, honed over centuries of innovation in Britain as well as Switzerland. From milling to polishing, to the painstaking task of tweezering together all those miniscule wheels, springs and levers, a traditional mechanical watch is a glorious tribute to human ingenuity. And for that reason, far from the anachronism everyone likes to think in our age of the Apple Watch. Watchmaking is an artform to be treasured, and thanks to innovative retailers like The Watch Gallery they have never been so relevant. I hope you enjoy the magazine. Alex Doak Editor

As you explore this magazine, which I’ve had the great honour of editing on behalf of The Watch Gallery, you’ll notice we’ve had some fun alluding to the various aspects of a gallery and its contents through the punning sections. But what’s occurred to me throughout this process is how much an

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THERE ARE EXCEPTIONS TO EVERY RULE.

ROYAL OAK OFFSHORE DIAMOND SET IN PINK GOLD.

CONTENTS

BIG PICTURE

PORTRAIT

DETAILS

WATERCOLOURS

BREMONT

LANDSCAPE

IWC

CLOUDSCAPE

ROGER DUBUIS

PRIVATE VIEWING

BRUSHSTROKES

TAG HEUER

PALETTE

ALPINA

FREDERIQUE CONSTANT

TWG PEOPLE

THE BIG PICTURE

PEAK

PERFORMANCE

No, this isn’t a feeble bit of Photoshoppery – that man really is flying over Mount Fuji strapped to four jet engines, a carbon-fibre wing, and nothing else. His name is Yves Rossy and, as part of Breitling’s comprehensive pursuit of all things airborne (which even includes a seven-strong jet display team) he regularly wows the airshow crowds as ‘Jetman’ by falling from the skid of a helicopter at 6,500 feet, getting up to a 160mph dive, then levelling off by simply arching his back. Rossy, a former Swiss fighter pilot and Swissair A320 captain then uses subtle body movements to manoeuvre himself, just like a bird of prey – there are no ailerons or rudders built into the wing. Naturally, he wears one of Breitling’s ‘Professional’ collection, to gauge when to throttle back and deploy his parachute – the slide-rule Chronospace chronograph (£5,100).

DETAILS

CLOSE-UP A MACRO LENS IS ALL IT TAKES TO REVEAL THE MIND-BOGGLING COMPLEXITY AND FLAWLESS FINISH OF AN “HAUTE HORLOGERIE” WATCH

Its 250-plus years of continuous production makes Vacheron Constantin the oldest watchmaker in the world and (unsurprisingly given all that practice) one of the very best. This is true “haute horlogerie” – an approach that takes the craft into a whole new stratosphere, with complicated mechanisms and such an uncompromising approach to polish, finish and decoration that it really does take “a certain sort” to painstakingly chamfer a part no bigger than a 5p coin for days on end. And if they scratch it? To summon no more than a shrug, a muttered curse, and start all over

again. Not only that, but every Vacheron watch conforms to the strict “Poinçon de Genève” standard of excellence, as set out by its native city. A strict set of 12 criteria, it essentially forbids any trace of machining on any part, whether that part can be seen or not. Hand-polished sink holes, striped bridge surfaces, angled edges, all as standard (and all resplendent through the caseback of the Patrimony Perpetual Calendar pictured below, priced at £58,900). As for decent water resistance, tough shock resistance, and high accuracy? Naturellement. /CONTD

DETAILS

Hublot’s Classic Titanium Automatic Tourbillon is a posterboy for the new “less is more” philosophy of luxury, spearheaded by a generation of sci-fiinspired watches made from NASAspec materials and dispensing with frivolities such as dials. It takes a whole lot of skill and plain chutzpah to render such an elaborate thing as a tourbillon so sparesely. CLASSIC TITANIUM AUTOMATIC TOURBILLON £66,700

The same could be said for Roger Dubuis and its Pulsion Skeleton Tourbillon as the Hublot. Not only that, like the Vacheron previously, this piece abides by the age-old standards of the Poinçon de Genève, despite the futuristic style. PULSION SKELETON £117,500

Another tourbillon, from JaegerLeCoultre’s Master collection takes the more traditional route, but still can’t resist showing off the heat-blued screws and gleaming rubies beneath.

Parmigiani could be the modern watchmaker’s watchmaker – showing how extreme complications like this chiming minute repeater can be done in a contemporary but exquisite manner.

MASTER GRANDE TOURBILLON TRADITIONNELLE

TONNEAU MINUTE REPEATER

£94,500

£291,892

Launching worldwide in 2014, the new J12-365 is a watch created just for women. But not just any woman – a woman who lives several lives during her working day, year-round. Accompanying her every moment, this beautiful piece’s versatile style is manifested in high-tech ceramic, crafted in the CHANEL watch factory at La Chaux-de-Fonds – Switzerland’s hub of fine watchmaking. The special technique used by CHANEL ensures a unique shine and sheen, coupled with exceptional resistance to life’s everydays knocks, plus an addictive lightness and thermal neutrality for maximum comfort. INSTORE. ONLINE. MOBILE WWW.THEWATCHGALLERY.COM

J12 365 COLLECTION AVAILABLE FROM £3,750

PORTRAIT

F R A N Ç O I S - H E N R Y

B E N N A H M I A S

“I DON’T BELIEVE IN TRENDS... I’D RATHER SET THEM”

AUDEMARS PIGUET’S COOL-CAT CEO, FRANÇOIS-HENRY BENNAHMIAS IS SHOWING SWITZERLAND HOW IT’S DONE Remember that scene in Star Wars when Luke Skywalker is being taught to feel the force by deflecting laser beams from a floating, softball-sized droid? To paraphrase Obi-Wan Kenobi, it is the sort of droid you were looking for, in the Millennium Falcon at any rate; certainly not in the office of a leading Swiss watch brand CEO in a sleepy village about a million parsecs from Alderaan (sorry, the remains of Alderaan). It sits on a window sill next to several variously sized miniatures of Yoda, presumably gifted to François-Henry Bennahmias by visitors who have read the quote pinned to his door: “Do or do not. There is no try.” The charismatic Audemars Piguet boss is even happy to admit that this line is his guiding philosophy in business. And why not? Not only is AP one of the very few Swiss maisons that’s still family owned and (relatively) free from draconian management, but it has a history for being “out there”, from making the world’s first luxury steel sports watch in 1972 (the Royal Oak) to pioneering the local Vallée de Joux complications industry a century before that. It’s this sort of focus that Bennahmias has been bringing back gradually since his promotion from the ranks in 2012, 18 years since joining.

“Instead of launching 30 or 40 new watches a year,” he said at the time with typical, disarming transparency, “we are going to slow that down. Let’s make sure that everything that we do is great. Then we can focus on growing again.” Bennahmias has even committed the luxury-sector’s greatest faux pas and lowered prices on some of his gold watches – selling more gold watches in the process, needless to say – meanwhile investing massively in brand-new case, bracelet and dial factories next door. “At Audemars Piguet we have always created our own path,” he attests, “and it is our spirit of independence which lead us to launch such an iconic piece as the Royal Oak when nobody else would have done it. It is still our philosophy today. Trends are created for us and not by us; I’d much rather set them.” It’s fighting talk that could, and should, worry his competitors. But for his next trick, Bennahmias is making sure his customers understand too: “Right now our priority is to communicate the sheer quantity and quality of work done by our watchmakers here at Le Brassus. At a time when everything is done through computers, it is absolutely mind-blowing to think every function in a fine watch was developed a long time ago when computers didn’t even exist.” Or was that a long time ago, in a valley far, far away?

PORTRAIT

C A R O L I N E

S C H E U F E L E

“IT’S NOT AN EASY JOURNEY...

BUT IT IS THE RIGHT ONE”

CAROLINE SCHEUFELE’S KEEN CONSCIENCE AND SOME FABULOUS CHOPARD JEWELLERY ARE IMPROVING THE LOT OF GOLD MINERS WORLDWIDE Heading one of the world’s most successful family-owned watch and jewellery companies alongside her brother, you wouldn’t blame Caroline Scheufele for resting on her laurels. But it was another variety of laurel that inspired her to do precisely the opposite: the Palme d’Or no less. Two editions of the Cannes Film Festival ago, where Chopard is principal sponsor, Scheufele sent her roster of A-list ladies down the carpet in a new ‘Green Carpet Collection’ of dazzling haute joaillerie – the first time that responsibly sourced, ‘fairmined’ gold had enjoyed such luxurious treatment, instantly raising awareness of the plight of artisanal small-scale miners in South America. So much so that this year the Palme itself was cast entirely in the ethical metal and brother Karl-Friedrich, who runs Chopard’s ‘L.U.C.’ haute horlogerie concern, was even inspired to make a tourbillon watch out of fairmined rose gold – the first ever. “The Journey, as we’re calling it, is the start of a programme that will ensure we are working towards our goal of sustainable jewellery,” attests Caroline, who acts as Chopard’s artistic director as well as running the jewellery side. “As a centuryold, family-run business, we are very aware of our responsibilities. It is not an easy journey, but it is the right one.” Appropriately, she was inspired to embark on her journey at another glitzy

affair – 2011’s Oscars, where she met the fashion industry’s favourite eco-consultant, Livia Firth, celebrating her husband’s win for The King’s Speech. “I asked Caroline where she bought her gold,” reveals Firth, “and she said, ‘From the bank of course. Oh…’ “As soon as she said it, she realised what I was implying. It wasn’t long after the Oscars that I got a call back from Caroline, saying she’d been thinking hard about our conversation and that she wanted to do something with [Firth’s consultancy] Eco-Age. “We are so proud,” she concludes proudly, “because they didn’t need to change but they wanted to. And now we have stars like Marion Cotillard and Cate Blanchett wearing some stunning pieces in the glare of the public eye.” With the Responsible Jewellery Council and the Alliance for Responsible Mining’s recent announcement that Fairmined Standard v.2.0 is now a recognised responsible mining standard, even more artisanal miners have the incentive to seek certification. And when you consider they account for 80% of the mining workforce and produce 20% of the world’s gold, sometimes in dismal conditions, this can only be a good thing. Bravo, Caroline Scheufele. Your move, everyone else.

LANDSCAPE

THE HILLS ARE ALIVE

...with the sound of milling, polishing and ticking Usually found nestled in the rolling foothills of the Swiss Jura mountains, spreading northeast from Geneva, the world’s finest watches are all made in ultra-modern facilities that contrast starkly with their chocolate-box surroundings. To the backdrop of snow, lush foothills and cows, you’ll find rank upon rank of watchmakers hunched at their benches, tweezers in hand, each of them absorbed by the tiny mechanisms powering Switzerland’s timepieces. Many of these zero-carbon multiplexes are still attached to the chalet-style barns where they began, such as Jaeger-LeCoultre in the serene Vallée de Joux. But how did they get here in the first place? It’s thanks to the puritanical Jean Calvin in fact, who banned the wearing of jewels in 1541 and forced Geneva’s goldsmiths to turn to a new craft: watchmaking. A century later, the watchmakers fled the crowded city northwards to the Jura and would farm cattle during the summer. In the winter, isolated by the snow, they would retreat indoors to manufacture watch components. Eventually, the local communities realised that, instead of walking to Geneva every spring to sell components to the ‘établisseur’ brands, more money could be made if they put their own names on the dials. The farmers therefore stopped farming, and families started to pool their various talents for fashioning the hundreds of parts comprising a mechanical watch. And thus the co-operative, cottage industry we know today was born. The factories shown here go one step further, however. They have mastered nearly all the 37 (yes, 37) skills required to make a watch from scratch, and brought the entire manufacturing process under the one roof. A top-end ‘manufacture’ brand can design

everything inhouse using 3D computer modelling; it can rough-out a movement’s hundreds of bridges, plates and screws with cutting-edge, computer-controlled milling machines; its polishers and finishers can decorate each tiny part before the watchmakers themselves delicately assemble everything.

With the booming interest in ‘proper’ watches, more and more brands are investing in these in-house capabilities – with conservative estimates placing that investment somewhere north of £20 million. Watches may be tiny contraptions, but the means of making them remains a vast human effort.

VACHERON CONSTANTIN, GENEVA

A short drive southwest out of Geneva city centre, Plan-lesOuates – or ‘Plan-les-Watches’ as many call it – could be the most high-end industrial estate in the world. Nestled on the outskirts, on the appropriately named ‘Chemin du Tourbillon’, Vacheron Constantin’s decade-old building is the most spectacular, strangely harmonious with the surrounding parkland.

AUDEMARS PIGUET, LE BRASSUS

One of the few family-owned, big-name manufactures still left in Switzerland, Audemars Piguet’s original building, dating from 1868, is soon to be juxtaposed with a radically contemporary structure designed to welcome visitors and extend its enviable museum – an archive that reads like a history of complicated watchmaking. The BIG architectural firm has conceived an overlapping structure of two spirals, inspired by the ticking heart of a watch, naturally integrated into the rolling Vallée de Joux landscape. The perfect marriage of old and new.

“These ultra-modern facilities contrast starkly with their chocolate-box surroundings”

ROLEX, BIENNE

Industry behemoth Rolex has consolidated manufacture of its movements on this single, ultra-modern 92,000m 2 site, open since 2012. New facilities include a fully automated stocking system that provides more than 46,000 compartments for safe storage of components and finished products, transporting items rapidly to the production workshops via 22 stations and over 1.2 km of rails throughout the site. The building’s architecture provides vast space and good natural daylight thanks to light wells, whose design was inspired by a watch movement.

JAEGER-LECOULTRE, LE SENTIER

Perched on the banks of Lac de Joux, a short drive down the valley from Audemars Piguet, you’ll find Jaeger-LeCoultre’s sprawling complex of buildings ancient and brand-new. A ‘manufacture’ through and through, here you’ll find over 180 kinds of watchmaking expertise, from the rarest craft professions to the most cutting-edge technologies, all under one roof, from case-machining to gem-setting.

ROLEX, BIENNE

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WATERCOLOURS

DEPTH CHARGE YOU COULD GO FOR AN ALL-SINGING, ALL-DANCING LCD CARBUNCLE… OR YOU COULD GO OVERBOARD WITH A BONA FIDE SWISS DIVING BELL OF A WATCH. HERE ARE SIX HOROLOGICAL WATERBABIES ROCKING OUR BOAT RIGHT NOW

IWC AQUATIMER AUTOMATIC 2014 was the year of the Aquatimer – a range that’s been going strong since 1967. Every Aquatimer now boasts the manufacture’s new external/internal rotating bezel, which only moves anticlockwise. This ensures that, if you were to accidentally knock the bezel during a dive, the time at which you can return safely to the surface wouldn’t be extended.

£4,250

WATERCOLOURS

AUDEMARS PIGUET ROYAL OAK OFFSHORE DIVER

CARTIER CALIBRE DE CARTIER DIVER

Still as fresh as when it was designed over 40 years ago, the Royal Oak is considered to be the first-ever luxury steel sports watch. The modern watch, in its beefed-up ‘Offshore’ guise is more used to the boulevards and teak decks of the Riviera than the azure waters themselves, but thanks to waterproofing and clever deployment of high-tech ceramic, it’s now fit for reckless paddling.

No one ever expected Cartier – that purveyor of sober dress watches and fabulous jewellery – to release a bona fide diver’s watch. But an authentic diving instrument it certainly is, even exceeding the strict technical requirements of ISO standard 6425. A dapper design means this is a rare ‘luxury’ diver you’d actually keep on as you sashay from the dive club to the cocktail bar.

£13,900

£6,150

“A Swiss diving watch could be the most versatile style out there”

WATERCOLOURS

BREGUET MARINE STEEL MANUAL

ROLEX OYSTER PERPETUAL SEA-DWELLER 4000

TUDOR BLACK BAY HERITAGE

Proving that diving watches needn’t always look like a diving bell for the wrist, Breguet’s Marine marries the brand’s delicate, classical style effortlessly with robust 100m water resistance and a surprisingly complementary rubber strap. Abraham-Louis Breguet himself would approve, given his duty as chronometer-maker to the French Navy back in the 18th century.

Everyone knows the Submariner of 1953 (James Bond’s choice for many years), but this professional version developed in 1967 became standard issue for marine engineers the world over. The 4,000m-resistant Sea-Dweller’s most celebrated advocates were the hardcore Compagnie Maritime d’Expertises (COMEX) who set the world open-sea diving record of 534m in 1988, Rolexes duly strapped over hyperbaric suits.

Rolex’s entry-level sister brand has returned to our shores after a muchlamented 13-year absence, led by this handsome waterbaby. A reissue of the 1954 original, in turn designed to offer a more affordable version of the Submariner, the Black Bay is now a classic timepiece in its own right, with a bezel of such rich burgundy you’ll want to pair it with a fine cheese.

£6,900

£2,120

£11,100

THE LAUNCH OF PORTOFINO MIDSIZE IS HERALDED BY A SPECIALLY COMMISSIONED CAMPAIGN BY SUPERSTAR PHOTOGRAPHER PETER LINDBERGH, WHO HAS SHOT CATE BLANCHETT AND IWC’S OTHER GLAMOROUS FRIENDS WHERE ELSE BUT PORTOFINO, ON ITALY’S AMALFI COAST.

IN THE FRAME

THIS ISN’T A MAN’S WORLD IWC HAS SURPRISED EVERYONE AND LAUNCHED A COLLECTION FOR WOMEN. EVE’S WATCH EDITOR LAURA MCCREDDIE FINDS OUT WHY

IWC is a man’s brand. That’s not a sexist statement but one of fact. The history of who’s worn its watches alone is worthy of its own Boy’s Own adventure series. It was an IWC version of the oversized B-Uhrs navigator watch that was issued to the German Luftwaffe. Being neutrally Swiss, IWC also developed a watch for the other side of the Channel. Its successor, the Mark 11, is considered the finest military watch ever produced, and even helped Edmund Hillary navigate successfully to the South Pole in 1958. Add to all this the fact that IWC’s ads bear the tagline “Engineered for men” and you’re pretty much getting the idea. No women allowed. Which is why its latest launch is a complete curveball. IWC’s newest Portofino iteration – the Portofino Midsize – is for women. Being a canny Swiss brand though, it isn’t being that explicit; the term “Midsize” is so the Asian male consumer, who certainly has a magpie’s eye when it comes to watches, isn’t put off. But one look tells you that, as far as its Occidental clientele is concerned, this is one for the fairer sex. And what a collection it is. All the design codes of the classic Portofino are there – the elegant tapering hands, long indices and simple case – but there is something beautifully feminine about them. The complications aren’t chronographs, but moonphases; the big date is still there but the dial is given a new elegance thanks to the removal of the power reserve and small seconds, while the GMT – called the Automatic Day and Night – is a masterclass

in how to make an intelligent woman’s watch. And, of course, there are diamonds. “IWC keeps a close eye on what people are wearing when it comes to watches and jewellery, on what trends are developing,” explains IWC’s CEO Georges Kern. “With the Midsize collection, we are making this line more interesting for customers with slimmer wrists.” Which basically means the Asian market or women. Despite this seeming like a massive departure for IWC, it wisely avoids weighing in at the hefty 46mm of the original Portofino of 1984. The idea of a 34mm Portofino is something that has come from the archives, along with the diamonds. “For 20 years, most of the Portofino watches we sold were midsize and the manufacture of watches set with precious stones goes all the way back to IWC’s very beginning,” says Goris Verburg, director of marketing and communication at the brand. “The Portofino Midsize models reflect a long tradition and open up a wider international market.” IWC aren’t alone in realising that there is money to be made in making watches that are designed specifically for women, rather than just patronisingly offering them a man’s watch that’s been shrunk, had its mechanics replaced with quartz, and covered in diamonds. Its launch into this market is part of a wider trend that seems to have Vacheron Constantin’s 2012 collection as its starting point, when, to the grumblings of some of the old guard, presented a purely feminine collection. It was a brave move, but one that made

people notice that not only were women becoming more interested in serious watches, but that, finally, the Swiss watch industry was actually attempting to cater to them properly.

“As IWC’s first foray into the world of women, other malecentric Swiss brands will be looking for tips” Fast forward to now and you’ve had TAG Heuer launching its first-ever female Carrera collection and Baume & Mercier’s new Promesse range, which feels womanly rather than girly and, most importantly, doesn’t feel like an after-thought. And it has good reason to make a splash with this collection. As IWC’s first proper foray into the world of women, other male-centric Swiss brands will be looking for tips on how to enter this tricky but increasingly solvent market properly. IWC may have previously bragged about being engineered for men, but this time it seems that women’s needs have engineered IWC, to fabulous effect.

#alpinawatches #startimer

YOUR HIGHNESS YOUR HIGHNESS #alpinawatches #startimer

S TA R T I M E R P I LOT Swiss S TA R TProfessional I M E R P I Pilot LOTChronograph Alpina AL-860 “Bi-Compax” automatic chronograph caliber Swiss Professional Pilot Chronograph 100m (300ft) water-resistant Alpina AL-860 “Bi-Compax” automatic chronograph caliber www.alpina-watches.com 100m (300ft) water-resistant www.alpina-watches.com

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HOMMAGE IS WHERE THE HEART IS ROGER DUBUIS’S EXUBERANT APPROACH TO WATCHMAKING CENTRES ON A COLLECTION THAT REVELS IN THE LEGACY OF SWITZERLAND’S FINEST HOROLOGISTS

IN THE FRAME

“I wanted to create a watch to thank my teachers, friends and all who had helped me learn my art” The collection is headed up by the frankly dazzling Double Flying Tourbillon. The architectural spaciousness provided by its new movement design sparked the idea of applying guilloché décor directly onto the movement mainplate – made all the more beguilingly three-dimensional by the sheer depth of the grooves. As you’d expect, this meant manually passing the engraving tool across each notch at least four times instead of the usual one or two, demanding a consistency of precision bordering on CNC-machine levels. No one makes rose-engine or straight-line machines any more, and only slightly more masters and apprentices are ensuring the craft stays alive, Switzerland-wide. By endorsing this near-extinct handcraft through its own edgy aesthetic, Roger Dubuis’s Hommage collection is going beyond mere ‘tribute’ – it is preserving the very foundations of Swiss haute horlogerie.

A sinister army of steampunk mannequins in stovepipe hats isn’t your typical welcome party to a pavilion at Geneva’s überexclusive SIHH watch fair – an otherwise reverent affair in various tones of eggshell white. In fact, you do have to remind yourself that Roger Dubuis represents the absolute zenith of industrialised haute horlogerie. From the exuberant glitziness of its ladies’ Velvet pieces to the tongue-in-cheek Arthurian fantasy woven into its Excalibur collection, this is the rare case of a rarefied Swiss brand making no bones about its youth. It’s even happy to admit that its target market isn’t a stuffy gentleman collector, with La Monégasque going after “the players”. Thus, it falls to “Hommage” to remind us that, despite its 20 tender years and resolutely contemporary vibe, Manufacture Roger Dubuis can hold a candle to the best of them, and then some. For a start, every watch conforms to the rigorous code of watchmaking as set out by the Poinçon

de Genève, which admits the maison to a highly exclusive club of venerable next-door neighbours, including Vacheron Constantin and Cartier. “Having founded Manufacture Roger Dubuis in 1995,” Mr Dubuis himself recalls, “I decided I wanted to create a watch to thank my teachers, friends and all those who had helped me learn and perfect my art. “Importantly, the Hommage collection is created by a new generation of watchmakers, who are maintaining the same initial spirit of their forebears and the horological traditions they originally perpetuated.” This year’s sweeping revival of Hommage cements this collection’s place at the heart of the Roger Dubuis universe. Hand-guilloché techniques in particular convey prestige by the spade, applied using antique ‘rose engines’, turned or operated by artisans guided entirely by intuition and feel.

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THIS PAGE: RENDEZ-VOUS BY JAEGER-LECOULTRE (£41,800) FACING PAGE TOP LEFT: PREMIERE BY CHANEL (£3,350) TOP RIGHT: WWI BY BELL & ROSS (£1,800)

BOTTOM LEFT: TYPE 20 BY ZENITH (£13,400) BOTTOM RIGHT: PORTOFINO HAND-WOUND BY IWC (£14,750)

PRIVATE VIEWING

STYLE IT OUT A TIMEPIECE SAYS AS MUCH ABOUT YOUR DRESS SENSE AS YOUR WATCH SENSE

PHOTOGRAPHY: HANNAH KIDUSHIM AND JUNIOR MONNEY ART DIRECTION: LAURA FINNEGAN GALLERY: BEERS CONTEMPORARY, LONDON EC1V 9NU STYLING: URSULA LAKE

“An extravagant flash of rose gold doesn’t have to be brash, as long as you team with a muted canvas of soft fabrics and textures”

SHE WEARS: HISTORIQUE AMERICAN BY VACHERON CONSTANTIN (£26,150) HE WEARS: YACHT-MASTER II BY ROLEX (£16,770)

PAGE 36: SHIRT BY COS, TROUSERS BY & OTHER STORIES, BAG BY GERARD DAREL. // PAGE 37 TOP LEFT: SHIRT BY AVELON, JACKET BY BANANA REPUBLIC. TOP RIGHT: WAISTCOAT BY HUGO BOSS, JEANS BY CITIZENS OF HUMANITY. BOTTOM LEFT: COAT BY TARA JARMON. BOTTOM RIGHT: COAT BY GIEVES & HAWKES. // PAGE 38 & 39: SHIRT BY LK BENNETT, DRESS BY MARKUS LUPFER, JEWELLERY BY LAURA LEE, SWEATER BY CALVIN KLEIN. JEANS BY RALPH LAUREN. // PAGE 40 TOP LEFT: SWEATER BY WHISTLES, TROUSERS BY EMMA COOK, JEWELLERY BY MONICA VINADER. TOP RIGHT: SWEATER BY CHINTI & PARKER. CENTRE LEFT: SWEATER BY RALPH LAUREN. CENTRE RIGHT: CAPE COAT BY CHINTZI & PARKER, BRACELET BY LAURA LEE. BOTTOM LEFT: COAT BY PRINGLE. BOTTOM RIGHT: SHIRT BY TM LEWIN, CHINOS BY HUGO BOSS. // PAGE 41: SHIRT BY TOMMY HILFIGER, TIE BY BRUNELLO CUCCINELLI, GLASSES BY CALVIN KLEIN.

PRIVATE VIEWING

THIS PAGE: FUSION BY HUBLOT (£19,100) FACING PAGE TOP LEFT: OYSTER PERPETUAL DAY-DATE BY ROLEX (£15,800) TOP RIGHT: ALTIPLANO BY PIAGET (£18,400) CENTRE LEFT: SUPEROCEAN BY BREITLING (£8,380) CENTRE RIGHT: BRITAIN BY BURBERRY BRITAIN (£1,195) BOTTOM LEFT: G-TIMELESS BY GUCCI (£2,200) BOTTOM RIGHT: DAYTONA BY ROLEX (£7,950)

IN THE FRAME

WRIGHT ON TIME THOSE MAGNIFICENT MEN AT BREMONT HAVE LAUNCHED A FLYING MACHINE SPIKED WITH THE STUFF OF AVIATION’S VERY BEGINNINGS. ALEX DOAK DOUBTS ANYONE CAN TOP THIS... “While standing about discussing the last flight, a sudden gust of wind struck the machine and started to turn it over… Mr. Daniels and myself seized spars at the rear, but to no purpose. The machine gradually turned over on us. The engine legs were all broken off, the chain guides badly bent, a number of uprights, and nearly all the rear ends of the ribs were broken.” So went Orville Wright’s typically pragmatic diary entry of 17th December 1903, scribbled back at camp on Kitty Hawk beach, North Carolina. The “machine” to which he refers is Orville and brother Wilbur’s “Flyer” – its irreparable demise doubtless placated by the fact that “Will” had piloted it 852 feet across the sands for 59 seconds just minutes previously, and three occasions before that. The first time, in other words, a heavier-than-air powered craft had achieved sustained, controlled flight. Critically, their Flyer had pioneered the brothers’ revolutionary “three-axis” control system of pitch, yaw and roll through “wing warping” – the principle underpinning every aeroplane to this day. But just as soon as they’d made history, the wings themselves were in bits. For a brand as wedded to the air as Bremont – it too with pilot brothers at the helm – it may seem strange they should deliberately draw from any sort of aviation mishap (despite Nick and Giles English originally being inspired to start Bremont by the memory of their pilot father, who died tragically in a crash). But if it wasn’t for that sudden gust of wind on Kill Devil Hill, NC, we wouldn’t now have a watch quite so special as the Wright Flyer.

It’s already a special-looking watch, but turn over this handsome devil and you’ll spot a tiny square of material affixed to the winding rotor – an otherwise unremarkable bit of unbleached muslin, spliced from the very fabric that coated the Flyer’s delicate wooden spaceframe. The lower-left wing to be precise.

“As soon as they’d made history, the wings were in bits...” The only other time a piece from the same section of fabric has left the clutches of the Wright family was in 1969, when Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon with a scrap tucked inside his spacesuit pocket. Bremont’s Wright Flyer, in other words, is nothing short of the ultimate link to aviation’s DNA. After years of limited editions spiked with bits of Spitfire, P-51 Mustang, then HMS Victory, and last year’s Bletchley Park Enigma Machine, it’s difficult to see where the English brothers can go next. A watch containing some of the first wheel, perhaps? “This is where it all started,” enthuses Nick at the glitzy launch party in London’s Science Museum, beneath a model of the Flyer. “When you’re thinking of an aviation limited edition with the ultimate historical link (and Giles and I have been thinking about it for a long, long time), it’s obviously the Wright Flyer. But we never thought we could end up with a piece of it.”

/CONTD

IN THE FRAME

“Movement-wise, we have stepped up to a whole new proprietary level”

“To know it was in Kitty Hawk in 1903 as part of the first aeroplane ever to fly,” Nick rhapsodises, “it just blew my mind. For us it’s the Turin Shroud.” “Only, the Turin Shroud was fake,” chips in Giles, “and our watch is certainly not!” For Amanda Lane Wright, great grandniece to Wilbur and Orville and custodian of their legacy, it was an easy decision: “The first thing I understood about the English brothers was that they’re pilots also. As pilots, they understand the exhilaration of flying. And I like that they bring famous historical stories back to life so vividly through their special-edition watches.” In fact, the story behind Bremont’s particular slice of history goes beyond Kitty Hawk. As Amanda recalls, after the Wright brothers packed up all the fragments from the Flyer’s tumble down the beach, they travelled back to their workshops in Dayton, Ohio and stowed them away, safely they thought. “In 1913, Dayton suffered a flood of huge magnitude,” she recounts. “The Flyer parts were just floating about in the shed, forgotten. It was only in 1927, when the Kensington Museum contacted Uncle Orv,

wanting to hang the Flyer and tell the public what this flying machine has actually done for aviation that he finally revisited the shed. He managed to put the aeroplane back together, but a lot of the cloth was too water-damaged to try to save.” So Uncle Orv carefully packed up the saveable bits, put them in a box, hid them away, and promptly forgot where he hid them. “It was years after he died in 1948,” Amanda continues, “when the family were going through his office that they discovered, high on a shelf, these beautiful remnants. And he had carefully labelled each one.” The fabric itself has been valued as virtually priceless, so it’s anyone’s guess what Bremont paid for their portion. But the proceeds from their fee and sales of the 450 pieces (300 in steel, £17,950, 100 in rose gold, £27,950, and 50 in white gold, £30,950) will all go towards the restoration of the Wright family home in Ohio. Furthermore, you’re investing in another massive development for Bremont: the brand’s first proprietary movement, ticking away for the first time in the Wright Flyer. This year’s hook-up with Boeing’s materials research centre in Sheffield, and

the ongoing growth of its Henley workshops means the British brand is positively glowing with manufacturing confidence. Working with long-term technical partner La JouxPerret in Switzerland, the BWC/01 calibre is new and exclusive to Bremont, with bridges and baseplate already being machined in Henley, before being combined with the Swiss bits. Eagle eyes will spot identical gear trains to other clients of La Joux-Perret (best not to run before you can walk) but otherwise this movement is darned close to being truly British. And it’s only a matter of time before all of it will be. “Movement wise,” says Giles English, “we have stepped up to a new level. We’re up to about 60 people at Henley now – that will probably double in the next two years with the new workshop we’re building. We’ve got amazing machines that no one has ever had in the UK before. It’s been a big investment but a very exciting process.” Those unremarkable little bits of cloth, bearing unbelievable historical provenance, have certainly found a suitably pioneering time machine as their new home.

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AIRFIXATION THE SKIES ARE POSITIVELY TICKING WITH AVIATION-INSPIRED INSTRUMENTS FOR THE WRIST – LOVED BY LANDLUBBERS AND FLYBOYS ALIKE FOR THEIR NO-NONSENSE AESTHETICS, PRACTICALITY AND A HANGAR-LOAD OF HIGH-OCTANE COOL

ZENITH TYPE 20 EXTRA SPECIAL Bremont may be scoring serious aviator points with its Wright Flyer tribute (see previous pages) but Zenith was there from the very outset of modern aviation, with some of the first-ever onboard instrumentation. Just six years after the Wright Brothers took off from Kitty Hawk beach in 1903, Louis Blériot made history by flying over the English Channel in his Blériot XI monoplane, with a Zenith strapped to his wrist. The Swiss “manufacture” even holds the exclusive rights to the “Pilot” dial marking. Reviving its highaltitude heritage, the Montre d’Aéronef (onboard watch) collection now includes this revival of the old “Extra Special” models, complete with chunky “onion” crown for easy operation while wearing flying gloves.

£3,500

CLOUDSCAPE BREITLING CHRONOMAT 44 AIRBORNE

LONGINES HERITAGE 1938

During the doldrums of the early Eighties, when cheap quartz watches from the Far East meant the Swiss industry was suffering, it seemed risky for Breitling to launch an automatic chronograph. But 1984’s Chronomat, created for the Italian Air Force’s elite Pattuglia Acrobatica Nazionale Frecce Tricolori display team, was a viral success, reviving the brand as well as the long-archived Valjoux 7750 movement. This year’s reissue now boasts Breitling’s very own in-house-manufactured chronograph movement, the “B01”, officially certified as a “chronometer” – the highest official benchmark in terms of reliability and precision.

The archive at Longines’ Museum in St Imier is positively bulging with designs and movements from over 180 years of history, and the designers upstairs have been having considerable fun raiding it in recent years. This reissue is a watch designed originally for aviators in 1938. Much praised for their mechanical reliability and robustness, these watches were soon on sale to the general public.

£6,000

£1,620

ALPINA STARTIMER PILOT

BELL & ROSS BR01-92 INSTRUMENT

The sporty sister brand to Frédérique Constant, Alpina made its first military pilot watch in 1921 and its no-nonsense aesthetic continues this year with this slick flyer. It epitomises the classic “pilot” look with its traditional layout and stealthy black-PVD coated case.

This youthful brand may be Swiss-made, but it’s still Paris-based, so every uberfunctional tool watch that exits the factory is also chic to a fault. The recent limitededition homage to a fighter-jet’s cockpit display includes this chunky ‘instrument for the wrist’, echoing the square, slot-in instruments like the heading indicator.

£1,950

£2,950 47

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BRUSHSTROKES THE DARK, BEAUTIFUL ART OF DIAL ENAMELLING WAS ALL BUT LOST UNTIL 15 YEARS AGO – AND IT IS STILL A RARE THING INDEED. BRUCE MELROSE EXPLAINS WHY

THE ARTIST It is rare that the word “artist” is used properly in the world of watchmaking. Plenty of breathless press releases and brand websites like to use the word “artist”, but when it comes to watchmaking, engraving, even gemsetting, the proper term is of course “artisan”. An undoubtedly gifted craftsman, but plying a craft nonetheless. Enamellers are different; enamellers really do deserve the “artist” job title. Their practical techniques, subtly different from atelier to atelier, qualify as artisanal, but the realisation of every dial is truly virtuoso. Shocking to think, therefore, that this exquisite facet of horology was all but lost to the world in recent memory, thanks to the onslaught of cheap quartz from the Far East in the 1970s. Every aspect of the Swiss industry was affected, but the demand for watch decoration was especially hard-hit. As companies hunkered down, external training programmes were completely scrapped, including the renowned enamelpainting course offered by Geneva’s art school. “I have seen some crafts disappear during the last 30 years,” said head of Vacheron Constantin Juan-Carlos Torres earlier this year. “Engine-turning almost disappeared, enamelling as well. At one point there were only two or three decent enamellers left in the world.” Anita Porchet was one of them. Out of work as recently as 2000, she’s now pulled pillar to post by the likes of Vacheron, for

one, but also Chanel, Piaget and Jaquet Droz – all keen to capitalise on the huge value imbued by her artistry. In fact, if it’s a high-end watch boasting an exquisitely painted dial, you can bet your bottom dollar it’s the work of Porchet. Just look for the tiny “AP” initials at 5 o’clock. If it’s not there, then it’s probably the work of her sole assistant. Despite the blue-chip clients filling her ledger – and offers aplenty of full-time employment – she still operates out of a tiny workshop in Corcelles-le-Jorat in western Switzerland, at Porchet’s family home. It’s an Aladdin’s cave of colour, with tiny jars of hand-refined enamel powder preserved in distilled water filling every table and shelf – a vivid kaleidoscope back in time. Unlike watchmaking itself, whose practitioners have learned to work in harmony with sophisticated computercontrolled machinery, the enameller’s workshop hasn’t changed a bit since the industry’s recent revival, or indeed since the start of the 17th century, when enamel was first used on watches. French Huguenots had arrived in Geneva and, thanks to puritanical Calvinist reforms, turned to decorating watches rather than jewellery. By the mid-18th century, the technique of miniature painting in enamel peaked, as a trip to Patek Philippe’s colourful museum in Geneva will attest. Genuine fired, or ‘grand feu’ enamel is and will always be extremely rare, as the

process is practically alchemical. In its original state the raw, silica material comes as large fragments. It is ground in a mortar to obtain a very fine powder – its ‘fineness’ judged simply by how it feels through the pestle and how the ‘grind’ sounds. After rinsing, it’s not just a case of painting onto the dial and glazing it. Rather, a laborious process of building and fusing several layers of enamel, each time baking the dial in a small desktop kiln, heated to over 800°C, for between 40 and 60 seconds. Since the enamel shrinks during firing, several trips through the kiln are needed to obtain strong colour and ensure all of the crevices are filled. This stage is critical: microfissures can destroy all the enamel artist’s hard work, forcing her to start anew.

“At one point there were only two or three decent enamellers left in the world” Each miniature can take weeks, and it’s all down to human feel and experience – something that, like so many of the nearlost watchmaking arts, can only be passed on from the master to the apprentice. It most certainly can’t be roboticised. Jaeger-LeCoultre hosts one of the industry’s only in-house enamel workshops, established in 1994 when one of the brand’s watchmakers Miklos Merczel rediscovered the ancestral skill of miniature painting by reproducing Art Nouveau paintings on the backs of Reverso watches. Today this workshop is home to no less than three miniaturists, all of whom have mastered all the traditional techniques (see “Enamel Panel”). And, finally facing up to the industry’s dearth of talent, JLC’s parent group Richemont and Breguet’s Swatch Group are both securing in-house capabilities by investing in the lost arts. Richemont is even building a campus in Geneva to train enamel painters and engravers from 2016. Anita Porchet needn’t be looking over her shoulder, though. Enamelling is an art, remember. And artists shine in their own light, no matter the competition.

THIS PAGE: PIAGET ALTIPLANO 38MM CLOISONEE ENAMEL FROM THE NEW MYTHICAL JOURNEY METIERS D’ART COLLECTION

FACING PAGE: JAEGER-LECOULTRE BOASTS NO LESS THAN THREE ENAMEL MINIATURISTS UNDER ITS ROOF, WHO TAKE SPECIAL COMMISSIONS FROM CUSTOMERS

ENAMEL PANEL FOUR WAYS TO DIAL-IN SOME COLOUR TO A WRISTWATCH CHAMPLEVÉ

The oldest enamelling technique. Cavities are milled into the dial, filled with opaque or translucent enamel. After firing, the piece is sanded to smooth and glazed.

CLOISONNÉ

Fine ribbons of metal are fixed to the dial creating the lines of a picture. The cells are filled with enamel and fired in the kiln.

PLIQUE À JOUR

Similar to the cloisonné method, but once fired, the thin copper backing is dissolved in acid leaving a translucent ‘stained glass window’ dial.

PAILLONÉ

Paillons are small gold leaf motifs, such as flowers, leaves or stars that are placed between two layers of enamel to decorate a dial.

SPEED DIAL WHEN IT COMES TO RACING PEDIGREE, THERE’S SO MUCH MORE TO TAG HEUER’S FORMULA 1 THAN JUST THE NAME SAYS ALEX DOAK

TAG HEUER’S REBOOTED FORMULA 1 COLLECTION INCLUDES THIS AUTOMATIC EDITION, EXCLUSIVE TO THE WATCH GALLERY (£1,225)

IN THE FRAME

Pause for a moment, and call to mind what you consider to be the most iconic image of Steve McQueen. Chances are, Great Escape motorbikes aside, it will depict the craggy heartthrob gazing intently off-camera, tousled helmet hair in full swoonsome effect, unzipping his white racesuit. His wrist is brandishing every watchnerd’s wet dream: an original, square-dial, crown-on-the-left Heuer Monaco, its cobalt-blue dial burning out of the Kodachrome celluloid. While the film in question – Le Mans (1971) – may not be quite as memorable, that promotional photograph serves TAG Heuer’s ad men very well thank you very much. McQueen wanted to base his character with absolute faith on Swiss F1 legend Jo Siffert and when it came to his wristwear, it was a no-brainer; it had to be Heuer. Jack Heuer sent him a box of watches, McQueen plucked out the Monaco, and made it a legend.

“TAG’S Formula 1 now looks every bit the mature racer thanks to a steroidal injection of chunky steel” It all started properly with the classic, round Carrera, celebrating its 50th anniversary last year – a watch that speaks vividly of Jack’s days in the pitlanes, where, sleeves rolled up, oil stains, the lot, he was setting up super-accurate timing equipment for all manner of Formulae. On the side, he was kitting out gentlemen racers from Indianapolis to Silverstone. A life-long fan of motorsport himself, Jack knew what was needed: a wide-open, easy-to-read dial and a shock-resistant case rugged enough to withstand a primitive

road surface and unforgiving chassis. It was 1963 when he launched the result – a mechanical, manual-wound chronograph named after the Carrera Pan Americana: the notorious five-day, 2,100-mile race across wildest Mexico. It remains synonymous with excitement, danger and heroism – and for all the same reasons was also adopted by Porsche as the nickname for its 911. Soon, practically every driver of the era – legends like Niki Lauda, Gilles Villeneuve and Emerson Fittipaldi – was wearing one of Jack Heuer’s chronographs. He was watchmaker of choice for Scuderia Ferrrari throughout the Seventies, until Techniques d’Avant Garde holdings (TAG) bought Heuer Watches in the Eighties and the renamed ‘TAG Heuer’ switched its allegiance to TAG’s principal asset: McLaren. TAG is still with McLaren and, by default, the choice of former World Champion Jenson Button. So who can blame the watchmaker for reminding us of its F1 pedigree? Step forward the Formula 1 watch – once a plastic entry-level product, now looking every bit the mature racer thanks to this year’s steroidal injection of chunky steel and a proper Swiss automatic movement. The one concession to Heuer’s past is the old-school perforated rubber strap you see here – exclusive to The Watch Gallery in the UK, and all yours for a highly tempting £1,225. Gentlemen, wind your watches.

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TONE IT UP FEELING BLUE? NO FEAR: THIS YEAR’S WATCH LANDSCAPE IS AWASH WITH COLOUR POPS AND PASTELS, MEANING THERE’S A WATCH TO SUIT EVERY MOOD OR MODE

LEFT TO RIGHT: PORTOFINO HAND-WOUND 8 DAYS BY IWC (£7,900) SUPEROCEAN HERITAGE BY BREITLING (£6,320) PONTOS S EXTREME BY MAURICE LACROIX (£4,120) BRITAIN BY BURBERRY (£1,275) HERITAGE BLACK BAY BY TUDOR (£2,700) U-2/BL BY BREMONT (£3,595)

PALETTE LEFT TO RIGHT: LINEA BY BAUME & MERCIER (£2,150) HYDROCONQUEST BY LONGINES (£790) KALPA LADIES BY PARMIGIANI (£6,900) SEASTRONG DIVER 300 BY ALPINA (£1,135) LUMINOR 1950 BY PANERAI (£6,700) SUBMARINER BY ROLEX (£6,050) IMPERIALE BY CHOPARD (£9,440) P1-5 BY SEVENFRIDAY (£850)

PALETTE

“Beware of the green-eyed monster: this year’s verdant launches are enough to inspire instant envy”

IN THE FRAME

NEW SUMMITS THE RUGGED, ALPINE CHARMS OF ALPINA ARE HARD TO RESIST – ESPECIALLY WHEN YOU NOTICE THE PRICE TAG As so many arriviste brands discover to their woe, the Swiss watchmaking industry is a tough nut to crack. Its very existence, its image and luxury cachet relies heavily on its heritage. And if you don’t have a past to speak of, your watches had better do something pretty spectacular, or revolutionary. For which, read “expensive”. Which means any accessibly positioned luxury Swiss brand hoping to break into the mainstream faces something of a challenge. It’s a crowded marketplace as it is, let alone a tricky pitch given everyone’s obsession with centuries of unbroken lineage. (In fact, Vacheron Constantin aside, very few brands can claim to have a completely unbroken lineage – mainly thanks to those dark days of the Seventies and Eighties when we all started buying cheapo quartz from the Far East. It’s just that some brands weave their history better than others…) So you can hardly blame start-ups for buying up the rights to old watchmaker brand names – names, incidentally, that invariably fell victim to aforementioned “Quartz Crisis” – thus getting something of a leg-up while the watchbuying public slowly come around to the fact the watches are superb in their own right. And so it was with the canny husband and wife team behind Frédérique Constant back in 2002. Having established a solid brand of accessible, mid-century-styled dress and cocktail watches, it was time to turn their considerable design and manufacturing capabilities to the lucrative sports-watch sector. As FC’s image was too

“smart” for a spurious offshoot into chunky cases and bright-orange dials, it made sense to revive a sporty brand that everyone would immediately “get”. Step forward Alpina – largely responsible for the concept of the modern Swiss sports watch, as we know it. Indeed, the 1938 “Alpina 4” united all four essential features, that all sports brands follow to this day: (1) anti-magnetism, (2) anti-shock, (3) waterresistance and (4) stainless steel. This year, joining a now-considerably mature range of diving watches, aviation chronographs, even a tourbillon based on FC’s in-house movement (see overleaf), is the newly revived “Alpiner 4”. This all-new collection features a bi-compax chronograph and a two-time-zone GMT model, encasing the new Alpina AL550 GMT movement, with an in-house GMT/24H module sat upon a basic Swiss calibre. The name may be more than 130 years old, but Alpina couldn’t be a more modern, progressive and – most importantly – accessible brand in 2014. If history’s your thing, there’s plenty here, but why get distracted by that when things are looking this up to date and just plain cool?

GMT 4 AUTOMATIC BY ALPINA (£1,575)

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IN THE FRAME

WHIRLWIND

COULD FRÉDÉRIQUE CONSTANT’S MANUFACTURE TOURBILLON BE THE BEST-VALUE TOURBILLON IN THE WORLD?

Just like Zenith and its “Open” watches, Frédérique Constant has always been proud to showcase the gadgetry whirring away inside. A “Heart Beat” dial window in some of its mechanical models frames the beating heart of the movement: the balance wheel, oscillating back and forth in a blur, dispensing tiny pulses of energy to the hands, tick for the tock, for the tick... It’s mesmerising. So just imagine if we took the balance wheel and its “escapement” gear train interface, suspended the whole assembly in a cage, which tumbled head over heels like a miniature merry-go-round. Well this is exactly what one Abraham-Louis Breguet did over 200 years ago, inventing the appropriately named “tourbillon” in the process (“whirlwind” in French). If the ticking balance is already mesmerising, then the tourbillon is practically hypnotic. It was invented by Breguet for the

pocket watch (see box), but it’s now a shamelessly redundant bit of kit, reserved by watchmakers for their most exclusive wristwatches as a technical showcase. Which obviously means they’re prohibitively expensive, right? Frédérique Constant’s no-nonsense founder Peter Stas disagrees. His Slimline Tourbillon’s £28,920 pricetag may stand in rather stark contrast to the core collection’s average £1,000 or so, but true to his and his wife’s founding mantra of “Accessible Luxury”, this is still less than half the price of most other Swiss tourbillons. And it even moves things along, with FC’s proprietary silicon escape wheel at the heart of it – a gleaming wheel of sci-fi geometry, visible in the close-up below. “It’s the result of some of our watchmakers who developed a tourbillon cage on our Manufacture 9xx Caliber in their spare time,” Stas recalls. “It was their

passion for watchmaking that drove them to show they could make such high-end calibre.” When they came to Stas with the prototype, sure enough his initial reaction was that it did not fit his brand’s positioning. “But, on the other hand,” he explains, “I did not want to disappoint them and undercut their passion. So we introduced it as a talking piece… and sold over 100 pieces! Now, the tourbillon collection contributes nicely to our turnover.” Impressively, his aim was not to create the lowest-priced tourbillon – the CHF500,000 spent on developing the cage alone proves that. “Rather, we calculated our retail price based on cost and our need to offer good value-for-money like the rest of the Frédérique Constant collection.” If ever the phrase “bang for your buck” applied to a watch, it certainly applies here.

ZERO GR AVIT Y

When Abraham-Louis Breguet patented his tourbillon invention in 1801 it wasn’t to show off his virtuoso watchmaking skills – it was to address a very real problem plaguing pocket watches at the time. Unlike wristwatches today, these would sit still in a pocket most of the day, with the heavy, pendulous balance wheel oriented upright, gravity “squashing” its central balance spring and affecting

timekeeping. But with Breguet’s tourbillon, the “tick” of the balance doesn’t just drive the gear train, it drives the whole assembly round and round within its own cage, meaning gravity’s ‘squashing’ effect is evened-out over 360º every minute. With a wristwatch, of course, brushing your teeth and waving for the bus is enough to do this, but a tourbillon still makes for a spellbinding spectacle.

B&R

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TWG PEOPLE

WHAT MAKES TWO OF THE WATCH GALLERY’S FINEST TICK?

Christine Borg-Mirza STORE MANAGER AT THE WATCH GALLERY, WESTFIELD LONDON

Nick Tolfree

GENERAL MANAGER AT ROLEX, BY THE WATCH GALLERY AT ONE HYDE PARK

YOUR FIRST-EVER WATCH? A Panerai Base PAM176 in titanium.

THE WATCH YOU’RE WEARING?

An Explorer I. It’s the most understated of Rolex’s professional watches and incredibly versatile; perfect with a suit, but also great for going out.

A steel digital Casio watch, given to me on my tenth birthday by my father.

THE WATCH YOU COVET?

A Selfridges limited-edition Bremont MBII with yellow case barrel. It marked my 20 years working at the Oxford Street store and my move to Westfield last year.

If I had to pick a Rolex, without doubt the yellow-gold Yacht-Master II. If I had the choice of any watch, Vacheron Constantin’s 1921 – the cushion-shaped ‘lazy American’ with wonky dial [see page 38 for both].

BEST ADVICE FOR A WATCHBUYING NEWCOMER?

Buy the watch you like – not because it might be a good investment, but because you want to wear it all day, every day.

WHY THE WATCH GALLERY?

“I love being frontof-house and advising clients from all over the world” 64

YOUR FIRST-EVER WATCH?

I get to work in Europe’s largest and in my opinion, most luxurious Rolex store. The variety of clientele is exciting and we have the most incredible selection of product.

ANY POST-WATCHSHOPPING KNIGHTSBRIDGE RECOMMENDATIONS? If you’re feeling celebratory then Heston’s Dinner at The Mandarin Oriental is an incredible experience!

THE WATCH YOU’RE WEARING?

THE WATCH YOU COVET?

I have two! A Jaeger-LeCoultre Memovox in rose gold, whose mechanical alarm is such a wonderful hidden secret I’d never mind being woken by it! The other is the IWC Perpetual Calendar Portuguese – its day, date, month, year, and moonphase are all programmed until 2499.

BEST ADVICE FOR A WATCHBUYING NEWCOMER? Ensure the watches chosen don’t overlap in style or features – build a storyboard of watches that complements your lifestyle and are enjoyed for different occasions.

WHY THE WATCH GALLERY?

I love being front-of-house and advising clients from all over the world. All the key brands are to hand at the Westfield boutique, which makes building your collection or choosing a gift seem effortless.

L I F E L I F E

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A B O U T

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A B O U T

M O M E N T S M O M E N T S

C E L E B R AT I N G E L E G A N C E S I N C E 1 8 3 0

CLIFTON STEEL, 41 MM SELF-WINDING

CLIFTON

www.baume-et-mercier.com STEEL, 41 MM SELF-WINDING

www.baume-et-mercier.com

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ROLEX, BY THE WATCH GALLERY, ONE HYDE PARK 100 Knightsbridge, London, SW1X 7LJ Tel: 0207 292 0345

THE WATCH GALLERY, SELFRIDGES LONDON 400 Oxford Street, London, W1A 1AB Tel: 020 7318 3830

THE WATCH GALLERY, WESTFIELD LONDON The Village - Westfield London, Ariel Way, London, W12 7GD Tel: 020 7292 1245

THE WATCH GALLERY, CHELSEA 129 Fulham Road, London, SW3 6RT Tel: 020 7952 2731

THE WATCH GALLERY, SELFRIDGES MANCHESTER 1 Exchange Square, Manchester, M3 1BD Tel: 0161 838 0660