The Watch Appreciation Thread - Part two (Rolex, Patek Philippe, Audemars Piguet, Jaeger LeCoultre,

[venessian]

It's a different level of consumption and purpose. To make an analogy in your field, whilst most people today would prefer a nice Renaissance Revival pastiche, it is the Gehry train crashes that will make it to the history and coffee table books and be referred to as art, Roger Scruton notwithstanding*. This is not mind you to say that the art world can be devoid of classicism, it's just that the classic space is already taken and novelty has to be mined on the boundaries. If you want a prime example in the watch world look up Arnold Putra on Instagram.

I'm aware my analogy is imperfect: where does one fit Foster + Partners? I guess you can do something more mainstream if you are yourself so established that the projects bring the meaning not through novelty but through their global identity, history and context (Reichstag) or once-in-a-generation scale (Millau). But this does not explain Santiago Calatrava.

* a long time ago I talked to the founding partner of a civil engineering firm, firmly in the Scruton camp, who pretended not to understand why a professional engineer would willingly work at a place like Arup when they could be lovingly crafting marble spiral staircases. He had to pay the bills so I think the 9th floor of their office was dedicated to skyscrapers and other "incomprehensible" projects. He drew an analogy with Beethoven 5 being built with just a few motives, but as a contemporary music composing and playing musician who hadn't yet read Scruton and his ilk, I couldn't help but think about how innovative and shocking Beethoven was for his time.

I honestly have no idea at all what you are talking about up there. Yes architecture is my field (neither here nor there really in this context); nonetheless I still cannot make any sense of what you were trying to get across.

I find the engraved Rolex hideous, as I did the 14-shades-of-blue 575M I saw. An ugly destruction of a nice watch, and an enormous waste of money from someone who clearly has mounds of it to waste. And yet, still: chacun à son déchets, period, end of story.

That's all, nothing more complicated than that, and certainly nothing to connect with such immense generalizations regarding some "statement on architecture". Perhaps something was lost in translation? Or you were trying to state something else entirely?

 

[venessian]

View attachment 1596010

But, given who those two guys shill, wouldn't that watch have to be a BreiLangRol?

Otoh, apparently "mash-ups" are all the rage these days so...one never knows. It might be a huge seller among the ultra-engraved-Daytona-wearin' / 14-shades-575M-drivin' crowd.

 

[9thsymph]

A manually rotating bezel is pretty low tech and less interesting vs a chrono. My attention deficit disorder needs more stimulation than a rotating bezel.

Right, pushing a chrono button, by contrast, is super high tech entertainment! Haha... ;-)

(Don't get me wrong...I love using my chronos...just find fiddling with dive bezels equally amusing from a more tactile, haptic pont of view...)

 

[venessian]

A manually rotating bezel is pretty low tech and less interesting vs a chrono. My attention deficit disorder needs more stimulation than a rotating bezel.

Right, pushing a chrono button, by contrast, is super high tech entertainment! Haha... ;-)

(Don't get me wrong...I love using my chronos...just find fiddling with dive bezels equally amusing from a more tactile, haptic point of view...)

What about fiddling with a chronograph which has NO operable dedicated buttons/pushers other than the crown, made by an interesting and very small (husband and wife only) small-town Carinthian manufacture? Fool your friends with your stealthy sleight-of-hand! Plus, semi-occluded dials, beautifully done!

Habring² Chrono COS*

* "The Crown Operation System, short COS, stands for Habring²'s exclusive patented world novelty. It means a chronograph which is operable completely without pushers, buttons or other operating devices. In order to activate the classic stop-function the well known and well tried crown is sufficient - the crown only needs to be turned around against easily felt resistances."

 

[venessian]

The Habrings referenced above seem like very cool people, a wonderful couple. Tough people, too. This is a very interesting lecture, covering from the beginnings to ETA and the entire "SwatchGroup greed/monopoly" impact on smaller manufactures over time; small-market economics and production as positive developments from what were initial fears; design improvement, sustainable processes and responsible relationships; etc. Very educational, presented extremely clearly. Well worth watching imo.

 

[ronscuba]

If it has got four legs and it is not a chair, if it has got two wings and it flies but is not an aeroplane, and if it swims and it is not a submarine, feel free to use its skin for your watch strap.

DofE RIP

Your above post is a little confusing. Your previous post was a baby alligator was murdered for a watch strap. You are against any kind of animal skin/leather for watch straps ? What about shoes ?

 

[Nickd]

This is super. Is it an older reference (no idea of the number, sorry) without ROLEXROLEXROLEX on the rehaut? I've looked at one of these previously.

Thank you. Yes, it’s a ref. 16600 from 2004 with a plain rehaut. Similar dimensions to a Sub of the same age, just a little thicker, rather than the considerably larger modern version.

 

[an draoi]

Your above post is a little confusing. Your previous post was a baby alligator was murdered for a watch strap. You are against any kind of animal skin/leather for watch straps ? What about shoes ?

The "baby alligator" was an attempt to identify the feature that @venessian didn't like about the watch he posted a few pages ago. The clue he gave was 'b', although I never figured out what the 'b' meant, even after he revealed the offending feature.

The post you refer to above was a bastardised quote from the Duke of Edinburgh. Replace "feel free to use its skin for your watch strap" with "the Cantonese will eat it" for its original form.

 

[Loathing]

The more I look at the 6119R, the more I like it. I want one.

Patek Philippe: The New Calatrava "Clous de Paris" 6119G and 6119R

Patek Philippe's two lateset Calatrava references, 6119G (white-gold) and 6119R (rose-gold), deserve the greatest attention for many reasons.

swisswatches-magazine.com

I prefer the original 1934 version. With Patek I find the older designs are almost always better than current ones, which are 99% misses for me.

 

[chocomallo]

“Hmm nobody?”

 

[Neville Southall]

I wear this watch almost every day. I switch to others every now and then to mix it up, but this is my go-to every morning when I reach inside the winder.

 

[Kaplan]

^ Your winder for that watch must be more complex than the ones I recall seeing.

 

[mebiuspower]

^ Your winder for that watch must be more complex than the ones I recall seeing.

Orbita Sempre is Automatic Watch Winder for Manual-Wind Watches

During our annual visits to Orbita at the various watch and jewelry trade shows, we always see an impressive collection of new and existing winders of all sizes, holding anywhere from a single watch to as many as 48. And of course, the vast majority of these Orbita watch winders — and most other wat

www.watchtime.com

 

[Kaplan]

Wow.

 

[classicalthunde]

speaking of winders - is there a common brand recommendation?