Basel thoughts and musings 2008

James Dowling

Each year I like to take some time after the shows to digest all I have seen and then to note down my personal thoughts on the shows, this one is about Basel. Please note that whilst the shows are actually happening the pieces I post are pure reporting of facts, there is little time to reflect or to take in all the things I have seen or to analyse trends. This, on the other hand, is all reflections, emotions and 100% personal, another person could see exactly the same stuff I did and come away with exactly the opposite opinions. So, please, bear in mind that what you read here are the thoughts and musings of a very opinionated blasé individual who has been to way too many watch shows in his life. I have chosen to break the piece into four parts, the stuff I liked, the stuff I wasn’t sure about, the stuff I disliked and my serendipitous find of the show. A similarly abrasive piece on the SIHH show will follow at some time in the near future.

Like:

Omega Olympic

The Basel fair was home to more replica and ‘hommage’ watches than I have ever seen, and as someone whose first love is vintage watches, I have to say that most of them made me want to puke. 95% of them just didn’t ‘get’ the essence of the watch they were supposedly paying homage unto. One notable exception was Omega's replica of the Melbourne/Helsinki watch of the 1950s; this new version pays respect to the original by replicating it perfectly, right down to the shape of the lugs and the text on the dial, the only difference is in the Roman numerals on the dial used to indicate the number of the Olympic games it commemorates. Even though the dial on this version is not enamel, as on the original, it uses a paint finish that replicates the original enamel dial perfectly and also promises to be considerably more durable than the original. Unfortunately it promises to be the toughest watch to obtain, it will only be sold at the Omega shop on the grounds of the Peking games and only 88 will be sold on each of the 18 days of the Games. Damn!!!

Concord C1 Gravity Tourbillon

I know that the revived Concord doesn’t pop up on most people’s radar screens, but I have to admire what they have done with their flagship watch, the C1. Acknowledging that everyone, including Swatch, have done tourbillons; they sought a way to differentiate theirs from the crowd, their answer was simple; take the tourbillon out of the case. Mounted vertically on the side of the watch case, just below the winder, this radical design has many benefits, it frees up space inside the movement, allowing room for other previously unused features (such as a ‘Trust Index’; more of which later). But mounting the tourbillion here has other advantages, it allows a radical way of displaying the seconds and it also allows the wearer to flaunt his tourbillion without actually pulling back his shirt cuff.

The watch has a power reserve of between 72 and 84 hours, however in order to maintain the best amplitude, it is advised not to wind the mainspring all the way, in order to ensure this, the user looks at the Trust Index and makes sure not to wind the watch beyond the safe zone.

Like Hublot with their Big Bang, Concord have acknowledged that there is a market for ‘hey look at me’ watches and tourbillon users are no different; when first introduced in pocket watches 200+ years ago, tourbillions were part of the movement & never displayed. With the advent of mass produced tourbillions in the 1980s (starting with AP’s 2870 in 1986) it became de rigeur to show off the tourbillion via a cutout in the dial, there is actually no reason why this has to be done, several firms (including Patek, Philippe) have made very expensive tourbillon watches with the whole of the movement discreetly hidden. Like Audemars with the ‘Offshore’ range & the previously mentioned Hublot, Concord have realised that there is a market for people who want their watches to look sporty, technical and expensive all at the same time & in concert with BNB Concept ,who came up with the technological side of the watch & Blade design, who handled the aesthetics they have come up with a watch which will easily find the 25 customers to fill its order book. It has the technological overkill look of a Mercedes Mclaren SLR and will appeal to exactly the same clientele.

Spring Drive Credor

This watch is a freaking masterpiece; the dial is amazing, handmade by Noritake, who make some of the most expensive chinaware known to man, it has the number 2, 4 and 7 in matt glaze, so that they are only visible under certain lighting conditions and then only at a particular angle. It is essentially impossible to photograph, but outstanding in real life. However the dial is the least impressive part of this watch. The movement and the case knock it into the proverbial ‘cocked hat’. My admiration for Seiko is well known, but if I have one reservation about every previous piece they have ever made, it is that they are aesthetically lacking. They are often over designed, with just too much going on, this is the first piece I have ever seen from them where the saying ‘Less is more’ has been taken to heart. The case, made from 0.950 platinum is pure in its simplicity but finished better than watchcases from any mass producer anywhere in the world, Switzerland included. Its quality rivals that of the individual masters like Gerber, Dufour or Baumgartner. Then we come to the real star; the movement. It manages a double rarely seen since Patek’s 9”’-90 movement from the 1940s, which is being aesthetically pleasing whilst simultaneously being exquisitely finished.

The layout of the movement is sublime in its simplicity, essentially there are three bridges, with a perfect balance between straight lines and curves, with small cutaways so that you get the merest glimpse off the moving parts within;  the mainspring barrel is cutaway in a lotus pattern so that you can see the edges of the spring within. They are worth looking at, because they are the only part of the movement which are not hand polished; and the only reason they are not polished was because it was found that so doing altered the tension in the spring, thereby changing its torque delivery. So the craftsmen (and women) of Seiko’s Micro Artist Studio gave way to the demands of the technicians. Whilst most watches have their shafts running in bearings made from synthetic rubies, not so with this watch, nothing less than natural ruby cut to shape & polished was considered to be good enough.

What makes the piece so special is the sum of many tiny details, many of which are seen here for the first time; for a couple of examples consider the ‘Glide Wheel’; which is essentially the balance wheel of the watch, its rim is made of 18k gold whilst the spokes of the wheel are made of aluminium. This means that the impetus is highest at the rim, which of course is right where you want it. Or examine the way the watch delivers its power from the mainspring to the going train; when a spring is coiled at its tightest it produces high torque which falls off as it unwinds, most mainsprings now deliver fairly constant power over their middle 80%, with high torque at the first 10% and very low torque at the final 10%. Over the last 400 years watchmakers have attempted to equalise the output , for many years their main tool was the fusee (a cone shaped device where a cord or chain unwound by the mainspring, it faded into obscurity about a century ago until recently revived by Lange & Sohne). In the 1950s Jaeger le Coultre used a complicated system of levers which stopped the mainspring from winding to either its maximum or minimum in the Futurematic, but that was another dead end. Seiko have used the micro engineering capabilities of their Epson division to construct one of the world’s smallest torque sensing clutches for the Spring Drive. The power output from the mainspring is fed through this clutch which only allows the desired level of torque through to the going train; the REALLY clever part is that the excess torque is fed into a reserve spring and when the torque sensing clutch feels that the output of the mainspring is dropping off, the power from the reserve spring is fed back into the system, thereby keeping the torque level at its optimum level and increasing the power reserve of the watch from the 60 hrs you would expect from a mainspring of this size to over 72 hrs.

What I love is that all this cutting edge technology is contained within a case & dial of such simple purity. But, if you want to know how I REALLY feel about it, when I was told that it would cost in excess of $60,000 and only sold in Japan I pleaded with everyone up to, and including, Mr. Hattori to be allowed to put my name on the list; sad to say, my pleas were met with stoic indifference.

Rolex Day-Date II

Going from one major producer to another, I have to say that the new grey dial Platinum Day-Date II is another piece I really like. Which is pretty strange because those who know me know that I am neither a Day-Date nor Datejust kind of guy; despite them being the hottest seller for the company, I have never really warmed to them. It isn’t just the increased size of the DDII that has swayed me; it is more the change in proportions and the stunning slate dial that finally forced me to see the error of my ways (so to speak).  The outer ‘railroad’ minute track in white encircles half a dozen circumferential grooves with the radially arranged applied Arabic numbers sitting atop the grooves. But what really makes the dial stand out is that these white gold numbers are finished in black PVD, thereby making this one of the great ‘stealth’ watches; it is by far the least ‘blingy’ Day-Date I have ever seen and I feel that one of them might find its way to my wrist ‘ere long.

Patek Philippe Annual Calendar 5396G

Sometimes it is the smallest change that turns a watch from an ‘also-ran’ into a winner and the decision of Patek Philippe to make their Annual calendar 5396G in white gold, as well as the previous red gold has completely changed the look of the piece in my eyes. I have always preferred the layout where the Month & Day were shown in windows to the more common arrangement of subdials, which I think clutter up the dial. The combination of this arrangement with the classic PP silver sector dial now looks harmonious with the white gold case unlike the same dial in the red gold case, a combination which always jarred with me. In watchmaking, as in life, it is the details that matter.

Becsei Primus

Aaron Becsei is hardly a household name, but this young Hungarian who joined the AHCI three years, has just produced his first wristwatch after a series of award winning tourbillon clocks. And what a wristwatch it is, with the world’s first fully jewelled three dimensional tourbillon (all previous 3-axis tourbillons have utilised ball bearings) and a level of finish comparable to the finest in the world.

With sapphire glass to the front, side and rear of the case the owner is able to see the tourbillon cage perfectly and watch it rotate through all three dimensions. At the SIHH a few years ago, JLC introduced their Gyrotourbillon at the same time as Franck Muller brought out his Revolution 3 watch, both with 3 dimensional tourbillons; when I made the journey out to Watchland (Muller’s version of Michael Jackson’s Neverland, but with expensive cars replacing the zoo animals and anorexic Russian speaking blondes in place of preteen boys), it was proudly displayed in a stand by itself; however it wasn’t working and when a colleague and I asked to see it in operation, we were told that it had been overwound by an excited distributor. An explanation I took with the proverbial grain of salt. JLC’s Gyrotourbillon took forever to reach the shops and yet both of these watches are made by established firms with fully staffed operations; Aaron Becsei, in contrast works alone and makes the entire watch by himself, including the magnificent massive white gold case.

Not sure

Patek Philippe Advanced Research,

In truth I found Patek’s announcement of their new AR model to be rather underwhelming, having introduced the spiral one year and the escape wheel the next, I suppose we should all have been ready for the pallet fork. I am also less than reassured by their use of the same annual calendar model once again. Call me shallow if you want, but if I have a ‘cutting edge’ watch (and if you are going to call a piece ‘Advanced Research’, and hold a press conference to announce it, then it IS cutting edge) I want it to look like it is cutting edge, not just more of the same old same old.

Patek Philippe World Time

I love PP when they pull a model out of the archives and recreate it with passion, look at the 5105P made to commemorate the opening of the new boutique in Geneva, but I hate it when they do it ‘half-cocked’, like the ‘Pagoda’ which was a great design utterly compromised by the decision to use a round movement; so it was completely the wrong proportions. I think that the new cloisonné dial world time falls into this second category. Louis Cottier’s original designs from the 1950s were stunning, and absolutely perfect. But sticking a cloisonné dial on an existing watch does not a masterpiece make. The proportions are all wrong and the italic typeface chosen for the cities is all wrong and putting even more of the same font on the bezel doesn't make it any better, believe me. But I am sure it will be a huge success and I am sure that no members of the Stern family will lose a moment’s sleep over my carping.

Rolex Sea Dweller Deep Sea

I have mixed feelings about the ‘Beast’; the technology involved is really amazing & reasserts the company’s position as the leader in dive watch leadership. Having been one of the few people who has actually worn one, I have to say that it doesn’t feel either too big or too heavy. I love the matt dial, huge indices, domed crystal, flush 60 min bezel and the bracelet. If you love precision machinery & the tactile (almost sensual) appeal of something that works properly, like the bolt action on an SMLE, like the advance lever on a Leica M3 or the gearchange on a Ferrari with the open shift gate then you are going to go apesh1t over the new bracelet. It is a masterpiece that, once and for all, demolishes the old saw about the firm’s bracelets. But on the other hand, I REALLY dislike the fact that the face has about as much text as one of Tolstoy’s later novels.   I suppose I am going to have to withhold my final judgement until I have had one for an extended test drive.

Disappointed

Every year, the one stand I really look forward to visiting is Harry Winston’s; I know most folks think of them as purveyors of sparkly stuff worn by actresses on OscarÒ night, but over the last few years they have made their fine timepiece division a place of pilgrimage for lovers of cutting edge horology. They have accomplished this amazing change of image through the Opus programme, where they team up with cutting edge young watchmakers and bring their (often experimental) watches to a much wider public. Previous Opus makers have included F-P Journe, Grubel Forsey and Felix Baumgartner, truly a veritable Olympiad of cutting edge Haute Horlogerie. This year ‘s watch is different in so many ways; firstly it is the product of a team rather than an individual and also in that it looks backwards rather than forward. The team in question is the Cellule de Spécialités Horlogères (CSH) at Renaud & Papi, and using some of the most advanced materials ever used in horology (they are normally reserved for Formula 1 race cars and fighter aircraft) they have re-created that icon of the 1970s, the digital watch; and not just any digital watch, the very worst of them, the early push button style LED watch. On the Opus 8, you do not push a button; rather you press a bolt, as on a minute repeater; and as you do, sections of the watch face slide away leaving only those segments which make up the hour display still standing in a perfect recreation of the face of a 1960s digital watch. Then, like the original, five seconds after showing the time, it fades away as the rest of the segments rise to resume their original position. You will note that I said the digital display was only for the hours, the minutes are shown in 5 minute blocks arranged along the left hand side of the display and the nearest 5 minutes are indicated by a moving indicator. HW state in their press release that time is only displayed to the nearest 5 minutes because “precision being secondary”.

I am sorry, but I just don’t ‘get it’; if we are to expend this much cutting edge technology in the furtherance of horology aren’t we entitled to expect a little better accuracy than the average sundial? The whole thing is summed up to me by the size of the images contained on the press CD, the one of the watch face is well under a megabyte, whilst the image of the watchmakers is over 6 megabytes; I am actually displaying a reduced version of this image (not something I would normally do) because they seem to want to look like the stars of a low budget French remake of ‘The Wild Bunch”.

This whole thing strikes me as a futile exercise, sure it is an exciting use of previously unused technologies but the result is almost the dictionary definition of ‘pointless’. I suppose if you threw enough time, money & resources at it, you could probably develop a mechanical television, but what would be the point? Same thing here.

Serendipity

Most years I stumble across a watch which I knew nothing about previously and which entrances me, usually it is whilst wondering the further corners of the upper floors or the outer halls at Basel (otherwise known as Siberia), often all that the smaller and newer firms can afford. However this year was different, my interest was piqued by a press release; not because it was beautifully written or well crafted but because it featured the name of a brand I had not heard of (or even thought of) for over 20 years. When a press release about Favre-Leuba’s introductions landed in my inbox, my finger paused momentarily on the ‘delete’ button and moved on. I had owned a Favre-Leuba watch when I was in college, it was the first ‘good watch’ I ever bought and seeing their name was like seeing the name of a college girlfriend thirty years later, my curiosity was engaged. So I saved the release and later in the day I read it, what made it even more piquant was that they were announcing the revival of the very model I had worn all those years ago. So I emailed the PR agency and arranged to meet with the firm at Basel. Interestingly, they turned out to be one of the very few watch companies who actually MAKE watches in Basel (not exactly the heart of the Swiss watch industry). I turned up at their manufacture to discover a beautiful house set in the middle of a residential neighbourhood, not the usual low-rise factory on an industrial park I am used to.

What I admired about them was their decision to plough their own furrow and avoid the mainstream, despite the fact that they had once produced over 600,000 watches annually; they now planned on an annual production of around 2,000. They choose to make sporty watches but not to offer metal bracelets; they make everything in house with a staff of just 15 watchmakers, except the movements, which are almost all Dubois Depraz modular movements made exclusively for Favre-Leuba. They choose to make watches with a different aesthetic, using unusual materials for the cases and dials, in other words, these are not ‘me too’ watches.

They have located some vintage A. Schild movements, automatic movements from 1967, a high beat (36,000bph) mostly used by Girard Perregaux at that time. What they have done to the movement, though, is spectacular; they have rebuilt it, but rather than using rhodium to plate it as is the norm, they have plated it with black gold, which gives it an almost spectral appearance, especially when viewed through the semi transparent dial (the darkened dial was used to protect the movement, and especially the oils, which have to work much harder in high beat watches, from the effects of sunlight whilst still allowing the owner to view the workings). Only 101 units will be made. The observant amongst you will note that the winding rotor has been temporarily removed from the watch shown, to give a better view of the movement.

I also liked their Mercury power reserve, with its multi-layered dial and off centred winding crown and date window.

Whilst Favre-Leuba may be tiny nowadays, I think that we are going to hear a lot more from them in the future & I look forward to their next introductions.

Please remember, all that I have written previously are the views of a very biased, somewhat cynical watchnut who has been to many too many watch fairs; I would be worried if you agreed with all I have said & I apologise right now if I have ignored, or worse, “dissed” one of your favourite brands. But I did say this was a very personal view of Basel; thank you very much for having read this far.