If you re into music, perhaps you hummed the headline of this column as, you know. Mary J. Blige and U2 started their duet version of “One” where the first lines say just that. Is It Getting Better.
Inspired by not only their spectacular past but probably also had enough of my constant blabbering about The One That Got Away, Morten Linde and Jørn Werdelin aka The Founders of Linde Werdelin, recently contacted me asking if I would be interested in a relaunch of the 3Timer with brown dial.
I apologise if you think you have recently read the headliner before. Maybe because you recently read an article or press review of the new Piaget Polo S. A new watch that is named precisely that: The Game Changer. But what is a game changer in the watch world? Well, Piaget calls their new Polo S a game changer. Not only because it is their first watch of steel in decades. But also because the Polo S is priced very compatible compared to…well, pretty much any watch from Piaget the last ten years or so.
I guess you have heard it already. The Swiss watch exports are suffering. Hong Kong and Macau are paralyzed and the Swiss manufacturers are stunned by export numbers that are as low as they were in midst of the financial crisis in 2009. The novelties on offer at Basel World 2016 did reflect on the slump and several of the luxury watch brands offered more steel watches that before.
The Panerai production headquarter is no longer located in the former police station near the lake, but has since 2014 been located up a bit further in the hilly Pierre-á-Bout area. The building is not a former this or that but instead a 10.000 square meters state of the art manufacture build specifically to Panerai offering a fantastic workplace for approximately 250 employees. Our reporter Kristian Haagen flew over for a visit and came back with facts and photos.
The interest of vintage watches has never been bigger than it is today. And while the Newmans, Nautilus’ and tourbillons keep breaking records, collectors start to look elsewhere for that new interesting timepiece. One of these interesting news is the Heuer Autavia. When Jack Heuer designed the Autavia, he wanted to create a stopwatch that could be used by motor heads as well as pilots of all trades. The name is a play with the two words AUTo and AVIAtion, according to Jack Heuer.
A paralysed Russian currency, record low oil prices and the endless wars in the Middle East. All this and other world problems seem to not really bother any of the watch brands presented on the luxurious Salon International de la Haute Horlogerie. Champagne was poured, smiles were big and parties were held for the carefully selected members of the world press and retailers.
Shoe polishing, the love of patina and a tight relationship with Chanel has made Bell & Ross a global household name among watch lovers. Will the young French watch brand grow into an auction darling as well? Like my father, I love shoes and the way they age. And when I was a kid my father would pay me a five franc silver coin every time I polished his shoes. I think this is why I love patina”, Carlos Rosillo tells me while visiting the Bell & Ross headquarters in Paris and going through a large book on patina. Certainly not your everyday read – unless you are Carlos Rosillo and Bruno Belamich.
Recently, it has been said and read that products that flash the makers' logo in big fonts and repeatedly on their products are facing a grim future. A new generation of influential shoppers seems to have had enough walking around like human billboards - which for certain brands sounds like bad news. But not for the makers of really iconic products. The Hermès Birken bag is easily recognized metres away, but would anyone recognise a Louis Vuitton bag without the LV-logos plastered all over it?
Smartwatches command acres of news these days. Die-hard collectors of traditional watches say no, open-minded collectors of fine timepieces would consider wearing them on the other wrist, and kids love them. Personally I am somewhere in the middle. But you will not see me in a sleeping bag outside the local Apple store with the first movers and tech bloggers, once the Apple smartwatch is ready for sales in my part of the world.
