WA T CH SPE CI AL A MILESTONE YEAR


Anniversary editions, playful creations and innovative designs characterise 2019’s best watches


I


suppose it isn’t really surprising that a business whose stock-in- trade is marking the passage of time should be so charmingly, hopelessly addicted to celebrating anniversaries. While some can be tenuous in the extreme, 2019 has


seen a flurry of major milestones. Tere must have been something


in the air in 1969, because this year marks the half-century of the automatic chronograph (and that of influential models such as TAG Heuer Monaco and Zenith El Primero), as well as 50 years since the commercial launch of the quartz watch by Seiko, a development that would send shockwaves through the industry. In a sense, we are still feeling the


ramifications of that invention; the balance of power shiſted from west to east, particularly in consumer electronics. More than 90 per cent of all watches are made in Asia, and while they are overwhelmingly at the lower end of the market price-wise, many parts in a “Swiss Made” watch also come from factories in China.


bus ine s s tr a v el ler .c om WOR D S C HRIS HA L L 91 Tis change forced the Swiss to


make their watch industry into a luxury business (so successful that, ironically, Japan’s Seiko is now equipping its premium brand Grand Seiko to go toe-to-toe with the major Swiss firms), and to invest heavily in a continuous cycle of mechanical innovation that regularly injects the fundamentally anachronistic device that is the wristwatch with new appeal. Tis explains why we have seen


carbon nanotechnology deployed at TAG Heuer, advanced silicon- based mechanisms used at Zenith, and brands exploring new materials and techniques. Unlike some of the whizz-bang watches from five or six years ago, the big bucks are now spent on measures that make a watch better at its basic function. Slowly, the big luxury brands are making their sales pitch more about efficiency, longevity and reliability rather than show-stopping complexity. Te difficulty is that their core


audiences still want watches that look like the old ones. Some, like Omega and Rolex, focus on improving their


TOP: Zenith El Primero A384 Revival


movements without drastically updating the looks of hero pieces such as the Speedmaster or GMT- Master II, but others are insistent that their clever new watches exhibit a suitably sci-fi aesthetic, banking on it appealing to a younger generation. I see no sign that audiences are so


easily divided up; twenty-somethings with the watch bug are just as likely to go straight into vintage pieces, and I am oſten leſt cold by new designs even though I firmly agree that if the watch industry is to reach 2069 in rude health, it will need to do more than relentlessly excavate its glorious past – big birthdays aside, the returns are definitely diminishing. Tis tension – what does a


“modern” mechanical watch look like, and do we really need such a thing? – will continue to dominate the conversation as watchmakers plan for a time when few people remember the moon landings first hand, but jolly well haven’t forgotten which watch Armstrong and Aldrin were wearing (and if you really don’t know the answer, turn the page).


→ NOV EMB E R 20 19


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