Breitling’s signature collection gets a contemporary refresh. Breitling for good reason, is well known as one of the world’s most important makers of aviation watches, and one of its best known collections is the Chronomat. The Chronomat is highly recognizable – the bezel carries the collection’s signature “rider” tabs, marking 15 minute intervals, as well...

Original vision, smart inspiration, and great execution. It is an often repeated truism, and I know this because I have often repeated it, that to be genuinely creative with wristwatches at this particular point in the history of watchmaking, is next to impossible. New ideas are thin upon the ground at the best of times,...

Putting the platinum in Extra Plat. When the Daniel Roth brand was relaunched back in 2023 (it is hard to believe it was so relatively recently because subjectively it seems as if there has been much more than three years’ worth of water under the bridge since then) it was with a complicated watch –...

A smaller DB28 tourbillon has a big impact. For many years, De Bethune watches have embraced a wide range of design languages, but one thing which, historically, these watches have tended to have in common are diameters of 40mm or larger. The decision generally fits well with De Bethune’s designs, in which there is a...

Patek Philippe’s latest alarm watch brings next level refinement to an often quotidian complication. If Patek Philippe’s newest wrist alarm were edible, it would be an artisanal burger with a prime rib price tag. Burgers democratize steak, and alarm functions democratize chiming watches. Hour strikers, grande sonneries, and minute repeaters are patrician things to be...

One of the world’s great classic luxury watches steps out in midnight blue sodalite. The Piaget Polo was originally released in 1979 and it was intended from the outset to be an exercise in deliberate conspicuous consumption, with the price at launch a then-astronomical CHF 3000 (according to Piaget CEO Benjamin Comar). In 2024, Piaget...

A Watches & Wonders launch of imperial splendor, that really puts the unique in pièce unique. While I suspect that it would make more sense to many of what in business one calls “the stakeholders” if I covered some of Chanel’s many series produced new pieces from the show first, I am afraid I have...

A more compact version of the Octo Finissimo has been on wish lists for years – and it’s here at last. The first Octo Finissimo watches – including the ultra-thin, record-setting Octo Finissimo tourbillon – were launched by Bulgari in 2014, and the hand-wound Octo Finissimo Small Seconds was 40mm wide, and just 5.15mm overall,...

Ceramics for most of history were fragile and delicate. Modern engineering ceramics changed all that, and watchmaking has never been the same. Making ceramic watches is a fairly new phenomenon, and with good reason. Nobody knows when the first ceramics were made, but the first evidence we have of pit fired clay vessels is from...

The Pulse60 balance seems to beat at an impossibly slow frequency, and at an impossibly high amplitude. Here’s how it works – and the surprisingly long history of the design. Dominique Renaud is one of the most respected names in complicated watchmaking, having been the cofounder of Renaud & Papi, the complications specialist where some...

The School Watch was the victor in what Jury President Carole-Forestier Kasapi described as a very closely contested race to the finish. The Louis Vuitton Watch Prize for Independent Creatives is held every two years, and the goal is relatively straightforward: identify a promising watchmaker with an original viewpoint and a proven capacity to realize...

A study in lugs, the most important part of a watch you’re probably ignoring. I am a sucker for weird lugs. Lugs are the handshake of a watch. They introduce you to the watch, and are a part of your first impression, whether you realize it or not. Lug design, in my humble opinion, is...

The persistence of Daylight Saving Time is one of timekeeping’s great mysteries; handling it in a watch is one of watchmaking’s greatest challenges. The idea behind Daylight Saving Time is a pretty simple one – setting the clocks ahead an hour, in the Spring (which is what we’re going to do this Sunday, March 8,...

How quartz rewired the Swiss watch industry, reshaped what mechanical watches mean, and quietly laid the groundwork for today’s hyper-consolidated, ultra-premium market. I used to ask my students a simple question. Does history change? Most would instinctively say no. History is the past. What happened happened. But the longer you live with history, the more...

There are seemingly more places to read about watches and watch collecting now than ever before in human history. Here’s one watch writer’s sample of go-to resources. Whenever I talk to anyone about watches and watchmaking, sooner or later I get around to talking about what it was like in the Good (or maybe not...

The Ship of Theseus problem, applied to vintage watch collecting and the uneasy line between preservation and transformation. For centuries, the Athenians preserved the ship said to have carried Theseus, the mythical king of Athens, home from Crete. As the years passed and the wood aged, individual planks were replaced one by one. The ship...