Archive for April, 2009
Luxury Watches: The Inteligent Choice
Luxury Watch Movement
Luxury watches have been around for nearly two centuries. The concept of keeping time on one’s wrist was something revolutionary during the 1800s. Before the wrist-watch, the most common time-keeping instrument was a pocket watch. Pocket watches eventually became obsolete as the wrist watch was far more convenient and harder to misplace. Some of the first luxury watch brands to emerge during the 1800s include Tag Heuer, Omega and Audemars Piguet. The term luxury watch refers to the quality with which the timepiece is hand crafted and the rare materials that are used in the manufacturing phase. By these standards, all watches during the 19th century were “luxury” time pieces.
With the lack of mass production and industrialization there were no cheap knock off watches to purchase. All time-keeping instruments were made by skilled watch makers, who made a life out of crafting small pieces of metal into time-keeping art. Today, the facility with which lower grade quartz watches can be mass produced has given a greater sense of distinction to watches that are made in the traditional manner.
All watches were originally mechanical. The employment of battery and quartz watches did not occur until the 20th century. Mechanical watches function by winding the crown of the watch, which in turn makes the movement unwind and keep time. The development of automatic watches was a great advancement. Automatic watches function brilliantly by having a pendulum inside the movement. The pendulum moves as your wrist does. When it moves it constantly winds itself, a feature that provides self-efficiency. Watches that are made in this manner are more practical, of better quality, more precise and much classier.
Luxury watches today are made the same way they were originally hand crafted more than 200 years ago. Switzerland is the country of origin for most high-end watch manufacturers. The art of watch making finds its roots in this country as well.
Most mass produced wrist-watches are such low-grade quality that they generally don’t last more than a year. Besides being low in quality, they do not keep time with precision. They will most likely lose 1-2 minutes a month, or up to 5 minutes if the watch is exceptionally defective. Besides all these inconveniences, batteries for cheap watches have to be changed at least once a year. Given all these characteristics, it is far more intelligent to purchase a quality time-piece that will last longer, yield a return if purchased as an investment and look like a piece of art on your hand.
Top Bvlgari Watches to Purchase
Italian design and classical aesthetics have always been an inherent part of the Bvlgari Watch Company’s interpretation of beauty. The designer brand’s watches feature smooth chic lines that challenge visual conformity and are reminiscing of Italian renaissance. The luxury watch manufacturer employs the same creativity and passion when manufacturing designer timepieces as it does in its perfumes, jewelry, scarves and fashion accessories.
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BVLGARI BVLGARI Timepiece
1) The flagship Bvlgari timepiece that launched Bvlgari’s debut in the international watch industry was the “Bvlgari Bvlgari.” This distinctively elegant timepiece was introduced in 1980 and quickly became an overnight international success. The designer timepiece boldly carries the BVLGRI logo engraved on the circumference of its perfectly cylindrical bezel. The watch is available with a quartz chronograph function that boasts 24 jewels.
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Bvlgari Grande Complication
2) The Bvlgari Grande Complication AA48PLTBSK/N is an outstanding work of talented craftsmanship and horologic engineering. The grand scale complexity of this timepiece’s movement features a day, date and leap year perpetual self-winding calendar. The tourbillion movement also has a 24 hour GMT function. The entire dial is transparent, which allows users to witness every single one of the tourbillion’s 26,600 vibrations per hour.
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Grande Complication
3) Bvlgari Grande Complication BB40C6PLTB has an impressive movement that counteracts the forces of gravity which hinder a luxury watch’s precision. The movement is designed to transfer energy to different parts of its components to compensate for gravitational forces exerted on it. By dissipating the gravitational stress throughout different parts of its components, the movement ensures longer life and greater precision.
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Bvlgari Reserve De Marche
4) The Bvlgari Masterpiece Reserve De Marche has an incredible 72 hour powers reserve in its caliber BVL131 movement. The masculinity and eloquent design of the watch is empowering. A convenient power reserve marker on the dial allows users to gauge the amount of energy stored in the movement. The extra thin profile of this precision time-keeping instrument is quite incredible considering the movement’s massiv power reserve and double barrel components.
Bvlgari can truly be considered one of the most important players in the international luxury watch industry. The advancements this Swiss Manufacturer has given the world of fashion and horology have continuously pushed the limits of manufacturing, quality, aesthetic and precision standards.
IWC Schaffhausen Great Luxury Watch-Maker
Very few watch companies can compete with the prestigious quality and stunning craftsmanship that IWC employs at its manufacturing headquarters in Schaffhausen, Switzerland. Collectors consider IWC timepieces to be coveted rarities. Discovering the company’s rich history and special role in the great horologic feats of the 19th and 20th centuries allows one to truly value the watchmaker’s grandeur.
An American engineer from Boston by the name of Florentine Ariosto Jones established the International Watch Company in 1868. Schaffhausen’s rich history in horology dates back to the 15th century, and provided a nurturing home full of skilled watch makers for the newly founded company. The original watch factory was located in the city’s oldest building positioned alongside the Rhine River, far from the watch making centers of western Switzerland. The city’s romantic scenery was untouched by the bustle and roar of the industrialization that had swept the rest of Europe. The only “modern” machine in the city was a hydroelectric power station that utilized the river’s water for energy. Ariosto decided to build the factory alongside the river in order to have access to the power station. This was revolutionary, as electricity was something unheard of in factories at the time.
Remaining loyal to their traditional means of manufacturing, IWC continues to construct all of its watches by hand, utilizing as little machinery as possible. The luxury timepieces go through a fully manual assembly line that creates every single part of the watch. IWC does not purchase any components from third parties. The factory creates everything from the case material, to leather straps, to each movement out of scratch.
In 1885 the company created the world’s first digital watch that displayed time with numbers rather than analogously. The Palwebb watch was created with the help of a patent by an Austrian man named Patwebb. The genius design allowed the watch to display time with rotating digits. Today, the Patwebb is one of the most sought after timepiece collector’s items.
IWC also charters a watch making school inside the same manufacturing facility. The prestigious school has room for 30 students, and courses generally last for 2 years. The institute allows students to have hands on experience with incredibly complex movements. The school demonstrates IWC’s dedication to the art of horology. As maker of genius timepieces, teacher for the next generation of watchmakers, and pioneer in the field of watch-making, IWC is a brand whose legacy will not soon be forgotten.
The Beauty of Alain Silberstein Watches
One of the greatest feats in horology is achieving precision with the work of the hand, and encasing it in beauty with the imagination of the mind. Alain Silberstein timepieces capture every single aspect of watch making tradition with one very distinctive difference. Their beauty does not lie in the magnificence of their movements, but rather in the avant-garde vision of their design. Alain Silberstein is a French interior architect and designer by profession, who in the late 1980′s joined the reluctance of Swiss watch manufacturers unwilling to let the art of mechanical watches become extinct.
The quartz craze in the 80′s threatened the survival of watch making as an art, and is considered “The Dark Age” of watch manufacturing by horologists. More than 2 decades later, Alain Silberstein watches are considered delicate works of modern art that resemble the works of Picasso or Britto.
The neo-pop theme is clearly evident in the timepieces’ vibrant colors which contrast each other in deep tones. Although the watches are modernly designed to excite onlooker’s sight, they are also crafted with traditional watch-making precision and dedication. Alain Silberstein and his 15 professional watchmakers produce a limited collection of 1,000 timepieces per year. The irony lies in that Silberstein was one of the most outspoken critics of the industry’s adaptation to quartz in the 80′s, due to a sense of respect and value for the traditional human elements that were involved in mechanical watch making. Silberstein’s timepieces however, are considered progressive, ultra contemporary watches that negate the traditional watch designer’s aesthetical vision.
2009 Timepiece Trends: Rubber Regulars
Materials like leather and platinum used to be the order of the day when it came to luxury watches. Nothing else could satisfy the stratospheric standards of sumptuousness. But now that even the standards of luxury are beginning to change as well, there’s a new player in the luxe materials market – rubber.
Rubber-strapped watches were once limited to just the lower end of the watch spectrum, to just the cheap, disposable or toy watches. Nowadays, though, even the highest-end watch brands feature rubber straps, and diamonds can be on the same watch as PVD.
Ready for Anything
With its primary goal of being the toughest watch you’ve ever seen, it’s pretty understandable for the Audemars Piguet Royal Oak Offshore Survivor to have molded rubber instead of the typical leather strap or metal bracelet. After all, you’d be less discouraged to get rough with your watch if the strap were made of something like rubber.
The durable material also fits in well with the rest of the décor on the Survivor. Molded black vulcanized rubber goes well with the brushed and textured black case and bezel of the watch. Overall, the material adds to the unmistakable impression of a very tough watch indeed.
A Tribute in Rubber
Few would question the use of a rubber strap with the Piaget Polo FortyFive, especially since rubber straps are commonly used with sports watches anyways. What’s not regular is rubber being used by a luxury watchmaker like Piaget, especially on a commemorative model like the FortyFive.
The matte rubber is an interesting contrast to the shine of the steel case on the FortyFive. It suggests a typical high-end watch with a not-so-typical sporty side to it – definitely a step in a new direction for Piaget. Aside from that rubber touch, the FortyFive is everything you’d expect a premium watch to be.
The New Luxe
Believe it or not, the diamond-abundant Perrelet Diamond Flower features numerous diamonds set into a metal case – all alongside a 100% rubber strap. It’s at the forefront of this whole movement of putting together old world luxury materials with new, underestimated elements under a well-known brand.
The Diamond Flower is an elegant mix of form and function. While it sports a breathtaking flower motif on the dial and a timeless design, a double rotor mechanism ticks away behind all the beauty.
It seems likely that rubber straps will continue to be a fixture in the high-value world of premium watches. It takes some elements from the low end, many elements from the upper end and puts them together in a previously unexplored middle ground.
