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How I Find Great Deals in Watch Auction Catalogs

November 28, 2020 By Stephen Leave a Comment

I’m a big fan of auctions as a way to obtain interesting watches for my collection. There are plenty of online antique, art. and specialized watch and clock auctions, populated with collected watches deserving of attention. If you look carefully, you will find some interesting watches, along with plenty that should be avoided!

Filed Under: Commentary, Grails Tagged With: Auctionata, auctions, Enicar, Glashütte Original, Invaluable, Jaeger-LeCoultre, Nivada, Seiko

How My Parmigiani Fleurier Tonda 1950 Went Bad, and What It Took To Get It Back

November 23, 2020 By Stephen Leave a Comment

“The email address you entered could not be found” is not the response anyone should receive when contacting the representative of a high-end watch company about an expensive watch that failed less than a year after purchase. But it was typical of the level of service I received from Parmigiani Fleurier USA. This is the story of my Tonda 1950 and the long wait to restore it to working order.

Filed Under: Commentary, Reviews Tagged With: Chronoswiss, Chronoswiss Regulateur, customer service, Parmigiani, Parmigiani Fleurier, Parmigiani Fleurier Tonda 1950, service, shipping, Tonda 1950

Why Have No Smartwatches Won at the Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève?

November 23, 2020 By Stephen Leave a Comment

It sounds like a rhetorical question, but the answer isn’t as simple as “because the industry hates them!” Why has the Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève never awarded a prize to a smartwatch? After all, smartwatches have officially been eligible for prizes since 2017, over a dozen models have been entered, and the group added a Smartwatch category in 2020. So why was that prize unclaimed? Is it that smartwatches are undeserving of recognition or is there a more prosaic explanation?

Filed Under: Commentary Tagged With: Alpina, Apple, Apple Watch, Frederique Constant, GPHG, Grand Prix d'Horlogerie de Genève, Helvetica Smart, Hublot, MMT, Mondaine, Montblanc, Seiko, Seiko Electronic Ink Watch, smart watch, Smartwatches

My Take on the Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève 2020 Headlines

November 13, 2020 By Stephen Leave a Comment

The Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève ceremony took place yesterday, November 12, 2020. Although attendance was limited to winners and helium-filled balloons, the ceremony once again proved both the importance and self-importance of Geneva as a center for the luxury watch industry. Although most of the prizes went against my choices, some were well-deserved and no one asked for my vote in any case!

Filed Under: Commentary Tagged With: Alain Silberstein, Breitling, Breitling Superocean, Breitling Superocean Automatic 48, Breitling Superocean Heritage II, Davide Traxler, Delirium, Georges Kern, GPHG, Habring2, Jean Lassale, Kenissi, Louis Erard, Ming, Parmigiani Fleurier, Piaget, Piaget 9P, Piaget Altiplano, Piaget Altiplano Ultimate Concept, Tudor BLack Bay, Tudor Black Bay Fifty-Eight

Two Movements, One Case: Alexander Shorokhoff Levels and Los Craneos

September 14, 2020 By Stephen Leave a Comment

Regular readers of Grail Watch know that I have a particular fascination with watches that contain multiple separate movements in a single case. Ever since the Nappey Jumelles Times and Ardath Long Distance of the 1960s, watch makers have used compact “ladies” movements in oversized travel watches for men. Now a modern maker, Alexander Shorokhoff, has done the same, first with the Los Craneos an now with the new Levels model.

Filed Under: Grails, Reviews Tagged With: Alexander Shorokhoff, Alexander Shorokhoff Levels, Alexander Shorokhoff Los Craneos, dual timezone, ETA 2671

What Was the World’s First Quartz Watch?

August 2, 2020 By Stephen 1 Comment

On Christmas Day, 1969, the Seiko Astron was launched; this was world’s first quartz wristwatch. Or at least that’s how the story goes. But the truth is much, much more complicated, as I have been researching and writing about for months. Only a few examples of that Cal. 35 SQ Astron were produced, and it was so expensive that not many were ever actually sold. And a raft of other watches (the CEH Beta 1, Longines Ultra-Quartz, various Beta 21 models, and even the Bulova Accuquartz) could make a credible claim. So what was the first?

Filed Under: Commentary Tagged With: Armin Frei, Beta 1, Beta 21, Bulova, Bulova Accuquartz, CEH, Longines, Longines Ultra-Quartz, Rolex, Seiko, Seiko Astron

CEH and the Beta 21: The History of the First Swiss Quartz Watch

June 15, 2020 By Stephen Leave a Comment

The development of the quartz wristwatch was a turning point for the timekeeping industry and shifted the balance from Switzerland to Japan and the United States, despite the fact that the Swiss industry developed the first such watch. This is the story of the tumultuous and controversial creation of the world’s first quartz watch by the CEH in Neuchâtel.

Filed Under: Commentary Tagged With: Armin Frei, Beta 21, Bulova, Bulova Accutron, CEH, Longines, Longines Ultra-Quartz, Max Forrer, Megaquartz, Omega, quartz, Roger Wellinger

The History of the IWC Da Vinci via Europa Star

June 5, 2020 By Stephen Leave a Comment

Regular Grail Watch readers might have noticed that I have begun using the archives of Europa Star rather heavily in my research. The editors noticed as well, and have invited me to be a contributing writer to that fine journal. My first piece was published today, and delves into the history of an iconic model, IWC’s Da Vinci. The archive brought me fantastic information and illustrations, as we will discuss today.

Filed Under: Commentary Tagged With: Beta 21, CEH, Chronograph, Europa Star, IWC, IWC Da Vinci, IWC Da Vinci Perpetual Calendar, Mechaquartz, perpetual calendar, quartz

More Movements, One Case

June 4, 2020 By Stephen Leave a Comment

I’ve recently written about the odd but surprisingly frequent practice of casing two movements into a single watch. From Nappey to Ardath to respected brands like Hermes and Cartier, many companies have used twin movements in a single watch. But what about squeezing in three, four, or more movements? The development of compact and inexpensive quartz movements made that possible in the 1980s, and this has lead to the creation of many novel oddballs.

Filed Under: Commentary Tagged With: Colani, Colani Apogee, Delaneau, Façonnable, Glycine, Glycine Airman, Glycine Airman 7, IceLink, Jean d'Eve, Raymond Weil, Raymond Weil Trianon

Two Movements, One Case: Ardath Long Distance

April 23, 2020 By Stephen Leave a Comment

Yesterday I talked about the Nappey Jumelles Times, the first dual timezone watch to use two separate movements in a single case. Although that model was quite obscure, today’s watch is much more famous. Ardath took Nappey’s formula and made it famous, producing a line of Long Distance watches that lasted a decade, including special models for Muslims and homemakers, and a cool sports model that reappeared in the 1990s!

Filed Under: Commentary Tagged With: Ardath, Ardath Hostess Long Distance, Ardath Long Distance, Ardath Super Long Distance, Ardath Wisdom, dual timezone, ETA 2551, ETA 2651, FEF 430, Islam, Nappey Jumelles Times, Royce Twin

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