This watch by Longines is an existing model that has been slightly redesigned for the 2015 collection, the latest addition to a series that has existed from 1954. It is a watch that has a lot going on, with chronograph, annual calendar and moonphase, with each of the three subdials providing more than one function.…
Dutch brand TW Steel have released an image of their Apex Canteen Style Limited Edition watch, made for their 10th anniversary, price €1799 / $1899. It is limited to 200 pieces, and has an ETA 7750 Valjoux automatic chronograph movement. The watch has a steel case 45 mm in diameter, waterproof to 100 metres, and…
This is almost a diving watch, in the sense that it offers nearly all the features required by ISO 6425, but not quite all of them. For example, an ISO 6425 diver’s watch requires that the hour and minute hands be distinctly different, and in this watch, they are pretty much the same except for…
Company profile: Maximilian Büsser was born in Milan, Italy, in 1967, trained in Micro-Technology Engineering in Lausanne, and worked for Jaeger-LeCoultre for seven years, before moving to Harry Winston Rare Timepieces in 1998, developing Harry Winston’s innovative watches with the Opus series. In 2005, Büsser left Harry Winston and founded his own company MB&F. The…
This is a watch presented this year by Longines, a new edition of a very rare 1940s watch known as the “Big Indian” of which just 200 pieces were made and sent to India for use by the British forces. That model had the manual Longines calibre 12.68 movement. The new watch is a classic…
Chopard has its own gold foundry, which gives them the chance to choose the sort of precious metals that they use for their watches and jewellery. The L.U.C XPS Fairmined is a men’s dress watch made using Fairmined gold, for which the gold has been responsibly mined, and the miners have been fairly treated and…
For a few years now, blue has been one of the trend colours in watches, and the women’s watch L.U.C XPS 35mm Esprit de Fleurier by Chopard is a good example. The XPS has long been a classic men’s dress watch, and the XPS 35 mm was introduced in 2014. This year’s new version, a…
Longines has a massive catalogue of watches, but there is one series in particular that I find very original. The Longines Master Collection Retrograde was presented in 2011, and its combination of classical finish and the relatively rare retrograde display give these watches a Breguet-like prestige far beyond their price tag. The numerous blued hands…
The name is very symbolic. L.U.C. is a reference to Louis-Ulysse Chopard, the watchmaker who founded the brand in 1860; 1963 is the year in which Paul André Chopard sold the company to Karl Scheufele, transferring ownership from one private family to another. With all this history, it is not surprising that Chopard developed a…
Longines has redesigned one of its historical watches in their new Pulsometer Chronograph, basically a column-wheel monopusher chronograph with a pulsometric scale that provides a reading of heart rate on the scale in red on the outside of the dial. Its classic design is reminiscent of the original 1920s watch type used by doctors, but…
Company profile: Longines traces its existence back to 1832, but in actual fact the brand name and the hour-glass logo first appeared in 1867. Auguste Agassiz joined a watch component trading company, Comptoir Horloger Raiguel Jeune, in Saint-Imier (Switzerland) in 1832, and in 1833 he took over the business. The newly-formed company, Comptoir Raiguel Jeue…
The L.U.C. Regulator by Chopard, presented at Baselworld 2015, is a new version of an existing model, with a new case. The Regulator is a traditional pattern, based on clocks in watchmaking workshops, with just a very large minute hand (there are three such clocks in Chopard’s L.U.CEUM Museum in Fleurier). The watchmaker would use…
The Audi Quattro (or Kvattro, as the Germans pronounce it) has four-wheel drive, the L.U.C. Quattro has four barrels. Meaning four mainsprings, giving it an exceptional power reserve of 216 hours, or nine days. At Baselworld 2015, Chopard presented two new versions of the L.U.C. Quattro, one with rose gold case and brown dial, and the…
Happy Sport by Chopard has become a very large collection and it is one of the brand’s most popular watches. Chopard’s determination to reinforce its horological positioning is shown by recent developments in the Happy Sport range, which from its launch in 1993 acquired its first 36 mm models with mechanical movements in 2013. This…