Luxury Insider

When I started looking for my first mechanical watch, I began my search by looking at all the traditional watch brands that were represented in various magazines from all over the world. I, however, decided that I wanted something different; something that changed the way people looked at the way time was told, even in something as traditional as a mechanical watch made with age-old methods.

One of the very first non-traditional watches that I found in my searches was the Gerald Genta BiRetro. This avant-garde watch really caught my attention. In a normal watch, the seconds, minutes, and hours hands go around in 360 degree circles; this watch, however, stops the minute hand after it has travelled through an arc of just 210 degrees, and uses its marvellous retrograde complications to pull the minute hand back to its new starting point at 8 o’clock.

Oops. I realize that I can’t say the “8 o’clock” position anymore, because the watchmakers at Gerald Genta have replaced the hour hand with a jumping disc at the traditional 12 o’clock position, just like a date disc. The date disc now has its own retrograde indicator at the traditional 6 o’clock position, and it travels some 160 degrees before it jumps back precisely to the starting point to commence its unusual travels again.

To make a hand jump back through an arc is already no mean feat, but calculations involving the time lapsed over repeated retrograde jumps during the time of days, weeks and months, make accuracy adjustments a whole new ball game. Add to this the fact that the jumping hour disc, the retrograde minute disc, and the date disc all jump at the end of the month, and anticipating this glorious orchestration on one’s wrist can really be an event to look forward to.

How many people can actually say to others that their wristwatch delivers a performance that one can look forward to all the time? Enter the next watch with a unique way of telling time: the Vianney Halter Cabestan.

It is not just made by a watchmaker intrinsically connected with the old values of independent watchmaking, but also an artist far ahead of our time.

The Cabestan is Vianney’s latest project to date, a watch that once again pushes the boundaries and blows the mind of any serious watch connoisseur. Inspired by old Curta calculators, this fusee and chain-wound watch displays the time by use of rotating barrels with numbers printed on them. The last fusee and chain-wound wristwatch was no other than the A. Lange & Söhne Tourbillon Pour Le Merite, one of the highest ever auction climbers in recent years.

Looks Ma, no hands... at all! One barrel has the hours printed on it, another the minutes, the other the seconds, and the last, the power reserve. One merely has to wind the wrench attached to the mainspring barrels, and grind away.

The movement of this watch is also completely new. Nothing like this has ever been done before, and I dare say that nothing like this has ever been thought of before.