The Premier Shinde Automatic 36mm is a tribute to Ambaji V. Shinde, whom Harry Winston met in Bombay in 1955, was struck by his jewellery design skills, and launched a collaboration that lasted for many years. Shinde’s style was based on the tradition of temple sculpture, and it laid the foundations for his design…
On 14 September 2015, Citychamp Watch & Jewellery Ltd., owners of Montres Corum, announced the appointment of Davide Traxler as Chief Operating Officer. He replaces Jacques-Alain Vuille, who will remain at the company. Overr the last 12 years, Traxler had previously covered several key roles at Chopard: he was CEO of Chopard Italy and of…
This women’s watch by Harry Winston brings to mind Damien Hirst and his installation “In and Out of Love” in which butterflies live out their lives to the full from pupa to hatching and living and reproducing, before dying and becoming immortal in art. Here, butterflies become immortal on a watch dial. The Premier Butterfly…
Company profile: RGM is a company located in Mount Joy, Lancaster county, Pennsylvania. This is America’s traditional watchmaking heartland: the Lancaster Watch Company was founded in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, here in 1877, at a location that had been used from 1874 to 1876 by the short-lived Adams & Perry watch company, and its factory was then…
You can’t help asking why Hamilton doesn’t make a watch like this. The RGM 801-COE Corps of Engineers is an evocative piece recalling the railroad pocket watches of America in the early 20th century, with the dial design that then became a feature of military watches in World War I. And it is based…
The first Dubai Watch Week will begin on 18 October 2015, running until 22 October, held at the Gate Village building 3 in the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC). It is organized by Ahmed Seddiqi & Sons, a luxury retail group with many boutiques in Dubai. The event will include an exhibition of watches taking…
Nicole Kidman, ambassador for Omega, is no ordinary woman, but her comments on watches provide an indication of women’s current preferences for watches. They are taken from the official Omega transcripts of an event organized in Milan on 16 September 2015 to celebrate the launch of an exhibition of women’s watches by Omega, and the…
Fastrider is a chronograph by Tudor, expressing its partnership with Italian motorcycle brand Ducati. The collaboration began in 2011, which is when the Fastrider was first introduced; this year’s version was inspired by one speciic model, the Ducati Scrambler (in the photo below), and its design and colours are tailored for a young biker audience.…
The H2 Aviator by HYT doesn’t look anything like a pilot’s watch, or even an aviation watch. It looks very much like an H2. Which is only natural. But it’s an indication of the remarkable interest that brands are showing in aviation watches, with beautiful pieces by Patek Philippe (their first ever foray into aviation)…
“Panerai is a disease.” This is a comment that frequently appears on the forum paneristi.com, where Panerai enthusiasts discuss their watches, and buy and sell them. It is run independently of the brand Panerai, and, founded in September 2000 by English Panerai fan Guy Verbist, it has reached its 15th anniversary. The brand is perhaps…
The Tudor North Flag was big news at Baselworld: a watch with the first in-house Tudor movement, the MT5612 that also appears in the Pelagos. Tudor, founded by the father of Rolex Hans Wilsdorf to provide lower-priced watches that Rolex dealers could sell, traditionally used ETA movements. This in-house movement shows that they are preparing…
Tudor retains its approach to marketing that hallmarked it at its origins: technical and reliable watches. While not everyone can be an underwater adventurer or explorer, Tudor taps into these theme with the Pelagos, a lifestyle watch that also has impressive diver’s watch performance. Most importantly, Pelagos shares (with North Flag) the big Tudor news…
Company profile: In the straightforward version, Hans Wilsdorf, founder of Rolex, founded Tudor on 6 March 1946, to create products with the reliability of the Rolex but with a lower price. This was a far-sighted move: he was, in effect, creating his own in-house competition, a fighter brand, for his principal marque. In a 1946…
Romain Jerome does steampunk exceptionally well. The idea of steam-age machines that have gone far into the future, retaining all their romantic smoke, rust and brass produced an entire genre in art and movies, and in a way, mechanical watches are already steampunk in themselves, anachronistic survivors of a mechanical age in an electronic…
The three watches in this new collection by Romain Jerome have the looks of the Steampunk collection, but there is no Titanic steel in the case, which helps bring the price point down. They can be considered the entry-level Romain Jerome Steampunk pieces, with prices starting at 8,950 Swiss francs. Each of the three…
Romain Jerome’s first skeleton piece Skylab was launched in 2014, a piece with horizontal bridges inspired by the space station (MB&F’s watch HM6 Space Pirate, on the other hand, was inspired by an imaginary Japanese manga space station). This year, it is presented in a larger 48 mm version, but with a slimmer case. The…
Company profile: Romain Jerome makes watches that are fun. Everything about the brand is fresh and entertaining, such as their booth at Baselworld 2015. While most brands are all about display cases and multi-media displays, Romain Jerome’s star attraction was freshly-popped popcorn and a ball pit. To entice the jacket-and-tie visitors to step in, the…
Clock radios are very much something of my generation. One of these objects woke me up every day during school and university in the 1970s, and that sort of design is very much part of that decade. It was quite surprising to see the new Romain Jerome Subcraft at Baselworld 2015, a mechanical watch…
Company profile: The story goes that Harry Winston’s career (he was born in 1896) began when he was twelve. He already had some experience with precious stones, because his father had a small jewellery store in New York. One day he scanned a tray of junk jewellery in a pawn shop with the label “Take…
This new Harry Winston watch has something of the brand’s design DNA, with the three rectangular elements at the crown that are a reference to the historic boutique on Fifth Avenue in New York. In two versions, rose gold and white gold, the watch is 42 mm in diameter, 10.2 mm thick, and has a…