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...

Revisiting the forgotten innovators whose ideas built modern horology. In our hyper-modern world, fame has mutated. Once it belonged to monarchs, explorers, inventors, and heroes immortalized in epics and stone. Now it wears ring lights and hashtags. Culture rewards those who are seen, not always those who built anything. Horology is no different. Our collective...

The first ever titanium watch stands at the crossroads of horological history. Titanium has become ubiquitous in modern watchmaking, and with good reason. It’s a nearly ideal material for watch cases; in general it has a higher strength-to-weight ratio than steel, making it more comfortable to wear (especially in larger watches) and it’s hypoallergenic, which...

Part 2 picks up with the Caliber 21 and the golden age of thin movements, then fast-forwards to today’s record-breaking novelties. Is this still watchmaking or just engineering gymnastics? In Part 1 of the story of ultra-thin watchmaking, we examined how technical acumen and fashion trends converged to push the world toward thin, accurate watches....

Long before “vintage-inspired” became a trend, the Minerva Pythagore quietly forecast the future of watch collecting — from the golden ratio to an early watch forum legend. The first time I heard of Minerva was when my wife gave me an engagement watch, a Montblanc Heritage GMT with a salmon dial. I’ll spare you the...

From Enlightenment-era escapements to Gilded Age dandies, the pursuit of thinness in watchmaking wasn’t just about design, it was about ambition, culture, and the quiet power of refinement. Someone once told me that history isn’t linear, it’s more like a web. A tangle of interconnected points that don’t always line up chronologically. Ripples echo both...