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Audemars Piguet
It was a classic example of having too much effort and never enough time to take action that resulted in Jules-Louis Audemars teaming up with Edward Piguet. Audemars hired Piguet to deal with increased demand for his exceptionally complicated watches, a passion Piguet shared.
The two became friends and, in 1875, created their own brand in Le Brassus, where Audemars Piguet remains now producing about 40,000 watches a year. Complicated watches are still a speciality, thanks in part to getting renowned movement makers Renaud et Papi as an AP subsidiary, however, the brand is best known for kickstarting the luxury steel watch trend with the launch, in 1972, of the Gerald Genta-designed Royal Oak.
There are other iterations, such as the Royal Oak Offshore, and models featuring perpetual calendars and chronograph functions but the straight-up two-hand Royal Oak remains Audemars Piguet’s legendary calling card.
Rolex
The best-known luxury watch brand in the world was started in 1905 by Hans Wilsdorf while he was living in London. Apparently, the title comes from a suggestion from a Hispanic employee that they call that the new trademark Relex which was an abbreviation of”relojes excellentes”. Relex didn’t cut it so Wilsdorf altered the”e” to an”o” and history was made.
As well as producing around 2,000 watches each day, Rolex is a new firsts.
It’s made a reputation for making highly desired, watches that were exceptionally pliable. No wonder that a gold Rolex can supposedly be used as currency anywhere in the world.
Despite appearances, the present incarnation of Lange & Sohne has just been making watches since 1994 as it established the Lange 1. There was a pre-war company in Glashutte but that was nationalised by the postwar Soviet administration. He refused and set up Lange 2.0 down the road.
Lange is renowned for the complexity and end of its movements. Every version is mechanical, with motions made from a metal called German silver and a hand-engraved balance cock. It’s also famous for its outsize numerals of its date indicator, a style it translated into jumping hours for its 2014 Zeitwerk, and for positioning the screens on the dial based on the principles of the golden ratio (approximately equal to some 1:1.61 ratio).
This can be precision German watchmaking at its best.
As its renowned”winged hourglass” emblem would imply, aviation has played an important role in the history of Longines. As early as 1919, the St Imier-based company was the official supplier to the International Aeronautical Federation, letting it create the highly precise and reliable navigation equipment used by intrepid flyers to place some of the earliest distance and endurance records. It’s a background Longines recognises in restricted re-editions of its heritage bits, but today the brand is starting a new collection — Spirit — motivated by, rather than purely based on, those celebrated models. For instance, at 1932 Amelia Earhart wore a Longines Chronograph when she became the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic, a journey that lasted 14 hours and 56 minutes.
Six decades later, Howard Hughes’ circumnavigation of the globe (in three days, 19 hours and 14 minutes) was timed by the company. Crew members wore Longines chronometer watches and a Longines Sidérograph — a device used to pinpoint location using the celebrities — was also onboard.
Whilst featuring the latest proprietary technologies, the antecedents of this collection are nevertheless very clear. Drawing on a number of the recognised features of a classic pilot’s watch, such as oversize crown, large”baton” style hands and daring dial fonts, the newest models — three hand/calendar models in 40mm and 42mm instances (from £1,650) and a 42mm chronograph watches — feature self-winding COSC-certified moves delivering 64 and 60 hours respectively.
Other contemporary elements incorporate a multilayer antireflective coating applied to either side of their vintage-style box sapphire plus a choice of matte black, grained silver and sunray blue dials, all of which feature Longines’ characteristic five stars representing their chronometer status.
The Villeret collection is among Blancpain’s earliest treasures. Its elegant exoskeleton houses classical time-telling display, with its Roman chapter ring, double-stepped bezel and conservative dial layout that’s remained overwhelmingly unchanged since its beginning. The group has seen its fair share of complications like moonphases and tourbillons, but the newest is a Villeret GMT that’s a very welcome addition.
Powered from the automatic-winding 5A50 motion, it displays a second time-zone that sits at a slightly recessed ring within the periphery, gestured with a red-tipped arrow. The clean dress watch is available from 18k red gold and steel variations, in alligator strap or mille mailles bracelet.
For the ladies watches, the Villeret conveys a brand new date version with features that accentuate the femininity of the timepiece. In the Villeret Women Date, the date displays through an oval aperture at 3 o’clock, using a ribbon redesign that is more cursive.
Both the steel and red gold versions incorporate a brilliant diamond setting, with 48 across the bezel and the following 8 to the hour markers, which pitted against white and opaline dials. An automatic-winding 1151 calibre sits inside the 33.2millimeter case, and gives an outstanding 4-day power book. In addition to the options of either an alligator strap or complete bracelet, the watches also include the stylistic addition of a kit that includes five interchangeable wristbands.
Fans of the brand could be familiar with Blancpain’s conquest of the seven seas, together with numerous homage and editions specializing in the Fifty Fathoms.
Reviving the era of the golden age of flying, Blancpain reissues the Air Command that could arguably be a replica of the first. The 2019 version keeps the all-black dial, bezel, and totalisers, the latter which are now 30-minute and 12-hour counters.
Also beneath the box sapphire crystal are”old radium”-kind SuperLuminova? About the numerals, indicators and hands to replicate the outdated lume of vintage timepieces. One of the requests for the first chronograph to be made was that it needed to be equipped with a flyback purpose; a non-stop reset and restart.
This then is not absent from the F388B, which is match with a column-wheel vertical and system clutch for easy time dimension. The motion is visible through the sapphire caseback, which can be wound automatically via a thematic propeller-shaped oscillating weight. The new Air Controller is sized at 42.5mm at a stainless steel and also dressed in a brown leather strap with contrasting stitching, and made from a limit of 500 pieces.