All posts in “Watches You Should Know”

How a Plastic Swatch Became a Hardcore Punk Icon

Welcome to Watches You Should Know, a biweekly column highlighting little-known watches with interesting backstories and unexpected influence. This week: the Swatch X-Rated .

For current residents of New York City who are enjoying the lowest crime rate in decades, it’s easy to forget the NYC of the 1980s where violent crime was rampant, crack cocaine was king, and not much was being done about it. Crime rates soared causing rent prices to plummet, which allowed all kinds of new subcultures to germinate in the city.

Punk rock flourished during this time in venues like CBGBs and A7, but with it came the violence and hard drug use that made the punk scene so infamous. Yet in the midst of the drug and alcohol abuse rose an opposition to it; a movement called Straight Edge was born within the East Coast hardcore punk scene, whose devotees refrained from the drugs, alcohol and casual sex that were so common at the time.

The movement quickly developed a symbol: a bold X, with adherents regularly marking large Xs on the back of their hands or anywhere else they could fit one. They did this to replicate the markings used by night clubs on underage attendees, indicating to the bar staff that they couldn’t be served any booze.

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Photo: DoubleCross Webzine

As Straight Edge was defying the norms of the punk scene in America, Swatch was born in Switzerland to defy the norms of Swiss watchmaking. The year was 1983, and the Quartz Crisis had come to a head. Hundreds of traditional Swiss watchmakers had gone out of business, but Swatch rose from the ashes. The name “Swatch” is a contraction of “second watch,” which was the idea from the get-go: to produce inexpensive and replaceable plastic-cased watches that people could rotate in and out of their wardrobe.

The idea was an instant success. The low cost of production and high profitability allowed Swatch to produce the wide range of unusual watches with bold, eye-catching designs for which they quickly became known. In 1987, they unassumingly released a minimalist, white-dialed watch adorned with a large X, and it fit right in with their catalog. However, the watch would quickly find popularity with an unintended demographic.

The Straight Edge faithful jumped at the chance to own another accessory with an X on it, making the Swatch X-Rated an instant hit among the movement’s members. Traditional punks weren’t typically known for wearing watches as they usually opted for spiked bracelets and chains instead, but Straight Edgers were quickly becoming less and less like traditional punks.

While punks typically adorned themselves with leather, spikes and chains, Straight Edge youth dressed more comfortably and simply: They chose letterman jackets and sweatshirts over leather jackets, crew cuts over mohawks, and sensible accessories like watches over studded jewelry. Straight Edgers were essentially showing up to concerts clean-cut and dressed like jocks — an archetype that was not common or welcome at most punk shows.

Yet, it’s this type of contradiction that typified the Straight Edge movement: they opposed drug use by abstaining, they rejected punk fashion by donning athletic wear, and they came to renounce the negativity of punk by adopting an optimistic moral outlook. For youths living in New York in the late 1980s, wearing their Swatch X-Rated to a night club meant opposing everything about the debauched lifestyle that was so common in the punk scene, and New York City’s nightlife in general.

Photo: Steemit

The Swatch X-Rated was eventually discontinued, which only bolstered the prestige it held. As it became more rare, the X-Rated dwindled from its status as a Straight Edge uniform and became more of a statement piece. For anyone at a Straight Edge show, an original X-Rated was the most reputable and hyped piece of gear you could own.

Eventually, the salad days of the movement faded. For both newcomers and nostalgic veterans of the Straight Edge scene, looking back at videos and photos of the original movement meant seeing the X-Rated everywhere, cementing its legendary status. The resale market for an original X-Rated rose to hundreds or even thousands of dollars; far more than the original retail price, and many people turned to knockoffs and copycats.

While New York City’s current nightlife doesn’t involve the level of hard drugs and violence it saw in the 1980s, the movement that rose to oppose it still remains: A new generation of frustrated kids have found meaning in making a commitment to abstain from drugs and alcohol, and there are dozens of Straight Edge bands still playing shows to an active community today. Much to the delight of those Straight Edgers (and the dismay of watch resellers), Swatch finally reissued the X-Rated in Spring of 2018.

While the originals still fetch a pretty penny in the resale market, a brand-new X-Rated can be had for just $75. And while the reissue has certainly reduced the level of clout that comes with owning one, it’s given a whole new generation of Straight Edge adherents the opportunity to partake in a decades-old tradition, and wear their beliefs on their wrist. And based solely on the number of X-Rated’s I’ve seen personally at New York hardcore shows as of late, I’d say both Straight Edge and the Swatch X-Rated are alive and well.

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February 24, 2020 / Comments Off on How a Plastic Swatch Became a Hardcore Punk Icon
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Why Did This Understated Omega Watch from 1947 Sell for Almost $1.5 Million?

Welcome to “Watches You Should Know,” a bi-weekly (the once-every-two-weeks kind) column highlighting little-known or notable watches new and old that have interesting stories or have had a surprising impact on the industry.

This is the story of a curious feature of mechanical watchmaking called the tourbillon, and it’s a tale that’s ironic on many levels. The tourbillon’s purpose today is primarily “for show,” but its symbolism is powerful, representing wealth, prestige, and one of the most challenging feats of micro-mechanical craftsmanship. Originally intended to improve accuracy in pocket watches, it’s visually captivating and became so popular with high-end wristwatch brands that others have gone on to build more cost-effective versions. So what makes people so crazy about the tourbillon, and how did it become the emblem of high-end watchmaking that it is today?

The tourbillon could be considered a kind of watch escapement. (Please bear with a little technical talk.) The escapement regulates timekeeping in a watch (which provides the familiar ticking sound), and is the most visually animated part of the movement, as among its primary parts are the balance wheel, which swings back and forth multiple times per second. (This system is easy to spot even in the most common, inexpensive movements.) A tourbillon takes this entire structure and puts it in a frame that revolves a full 360 degrees. So it’s ticking and twitching and turning all at once. Tourbillons are extremely complicated to produce, with a lot of tiny, precise components — and they’re dazzling to observe.

The tourbillon was invented by none other than the seminal 18th-century watchmaker Mr. Abraham Louis Breguet, and the idea was to counter the effects of gravity on the escapement of a pocket watch. Pocket watches were largely worn vertically in waistcoat pockets, but even this orientation could change by up to 45 degrees, and gravity’s effects on the escapement would cause a deviation in timekeeping accuracy. (If the watch was then stored horizontally on a table at night, the effects could be even more pronounced.) By rotating the escapement, however, deviations would be “evened out,” as the escapement was constantly changing its orientation.

The simple fact that a wrist-born timepiece is constantly changing the orientation of the escapement has meant that the tourbillon is largely superfluous in modern watchmaking. Complicated and delicate, they’re generally found in very high-end luxury pieces which sticker prices starting in the mid to high five-figure range, and going way up from there.

In the 1940s, however, the tourbillon was a rare and largely forgotten curiosity of horological history, mostly found only in the occasional pocket watch. The Swiss were worried about the strong American and British watch industry (the Japanese threat was not yet apparent), and constantly improving accuracy was one way to stay relevant and competitive. Omega experimented with a wristwatch-sized tourbillon escapement meant to compete in third-party trials for “observatory chronometers” — watches that passed these tests and were given this designation would give Omega a legitimate claim to high accuracy and marketing clout.

Omega’s tourbillon movements were built to high standards and did well in the trials, but such competitions were essentially meant for R&D purposes as well as overall brand prestige — they were mostly never even put in watch cases. There were a total of 12 of these tourbillon movements made, and they took part in the observatory trials between 1947 and 1952. In 1987, seven of the tourbillon movements were rediscovered by Omega, rebuilt, cased, and sold to collectors. There was one more, however, that was originally cased in 1947 as a prototype with the apparent intent to eventually put it into production.

In 2017, this very watch was auctioned for almost $1.5 million. In retrospect, it represented the beginning of the modern tourbillon craze (though the craze is now abating compared to where it was several years ago). When Omega’s engineers produced a prototype tourbillon intended for a wristwatch in 1947, however, their goals were purely practical and chronometric. That’s very different from the contemporary “expensive novelty” status of tourbillons.

The Omega Calibre 30 I is notable even if it can’t claim to be the “first” tourbillon-equipped wristwatch — French brand Lip had one in the 1930s and other brands produced wristwatch-sized movements that never actually found their way into wristwatch cases. Too difficult and expensive to produce, the tourbillon was far from an efficient or effective way to improve accuracy.

At some point, however, people noticed that they look incredible…

Today, the watch and tourbillon scene is very different than it was when Omega’s 1947 prototype hid its tourbillon behind a solid case back as part of a largely undecorated movement. It’s now the symbol of haute horlogerie, often in watches costing as much as a house, and almost every high-end brand has made it a major part of their halo-product offerings. Even more notable is that brands are now trying to make “affordable tourbillons”: Stroll through the halls of the Hong Kong Watch & Clock fair, and scores of Chinese brands are offering tourbillons for far less. Even brands like TAG Heuer and Frederique Constant have made headlines with Swiss Made tourbillon watches costing under $20,000.

The brilliant idea of displaying the highly animated tourbillon on the front of a watch is claimed by Franck Muller in a piece from 1984 (before his eponymous brand was even established). Now it’s the norm, and tourbillon-equipped watches are often accompanied by a high level of finishing, as well as avant-garde designs meant to dazzle as they show off the delicate mechanics.

While still a relatively rare feature, tourbillons are today included among so many high-end watches that their novelty and exotic appeal is diminished. Unnecessary, overly complicated, inefficient, expensive, and technically anachronistic? Yes, but they are also nothing short of eye candy, as well as technically fascinating representations of history and craftsmanship. Mechanical watches themselves could be described in the same way.

October 22, 2019 / Comments Off on Why Did This Understated Omega Watch from 1947 Sell for Almost $1.5 Million?
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Why Did This Understated Omega Watch from 1947 Sell for Over $1.5 Million?

Welcome to “Watches You Should Know,” a bi-weekly (the once-every-two-weeks kind) column highlighting little-known or notable watches new and old that have interesting stories or have had a surprising impact on the industry.

This is the story of a curious feature of mechanical watchmaking called the tourbillon, and it’s a tale that’s ironic on many levels. The tourbillon’s purpose today is primarily “for show,” but its symbolism is powerful, representing wealth, prestige, and one of the most challenging feats of micro-mechanical craftsmanship. Originally intended to improve accuracy in pocket watches, it’s visually captivating and became so popular with high-end wristwatch brands that others have gone to build more cost-effective versions. So what makes people so crazy about the tourbillon, and how did it become the emblem of high-end watchmaking that it is today?

The tourbillon could be considered a kind of watch escapement. (Please bear with a little technical talk.) The escapement regulates timekeeping in a watch (which provides the familiar ticking sound), and is the most visually animated part of the movement, as among its primary parts are the balance wheel, which swings back and forth multiple times per second. (This system is easy to spot even in the most common, inexpensive movements.) A tourbillon takes this entire structure and puts it in a frame that revolves a full 360 degrees. So it’s ticking and twitching and turning all at once. Tourbillons are extremely complicated to produce, with a lot of tiny, precise components — and they’re dazzling to observe.

The tourbillon was invented by none other than the seminal 18th-century watchmaker Mr. Abraham Louis Breguet, and that the idea was to counter the effects of gravity on the escapement of a pocket watch. Pocket watches were largely worn vertically in waistcoat pockets, but even this orientation could change by up to 45 degrees, and gravity’s effects on the escapement would cause a deviation in timekeeping accuracy. (If the watch was then stored horizontally on a table at night, the effects could be even more pronounced.) By rotating the escapement, however, deviations would be “evened out,” as the escapement was constantly changing its orientation.

The simple fact that a wrist-born timepiece is constantly changing the orientation of the escapement has meant that the tourbillon is largely superfluous in modern watchmaking. Complicated and delicate, they’re generally only included in super high-end luxury pieces which sticker prices in the tens (or hundreds) of thousands of dollars.

In the 1940s, however, the tourbillon was a rare and largely forgotten curiosity of horological history, mostly found only in the occasional pocket watch. The Swiss were worried about the strong American and British watch industry (the Japanese threat was not yet made manifest), and constantly improving accuracy was one way to stay relevant and competitive. Omega experimented with a wristwatch-born tourbillon escapement meant to compete in third-party trials for “observatory chronometers” — watches that passed these tests and were given this designation would give Omega a legitimate claim to high accuracy and marketing clout.

Omega’s tourbillon movements were built to high standards and did well in the trials, but such competitions were essentially meant for R&D purposes as well as overall brand prestige — they were mostly never even put in watch cases. There were a total of 12 of these tourbillon movements made, and they took part in the observatory trials between 1947 and 1952. In 1987, seven of the tourbillon movements were rediscovered by Omega, rebuilt, cased, and sold to collectors. There was one more, however, that was originally cased in 1947 as a prototype with the apparent intent to eventually put it into production.

In 2017, this very watch was auctioned for almost $1.5 million. In retrospect, it represented the beginning of the modern tourbillon craze (though the craze is now abating compared to where it was several years ago). When Omega’s engineers produced a prototype tourbillon intended for a wristwatch in 1947, however, their goals were purely practical and chronometric. While most tourbillons today are made to be displayed on the dial side of the watch, Omega’s 30 I was not even visible unless you removed the watch’s solid case back to look at the movement.

The Omega Calibre 30 I is notable even if it can’t claim to be the “first” tourbillon-equipped wristwatch — French brand Lip had one in the 1930s and other brands produced wristwatch-sized movements that never actually found their way into wristwatch cases. Too difficult and expensive to produce, the tourbillon was far from an efficient or effective way to improve accuracy.

At some point, however, people noticed that they look incredible…

Today, the watch and tourbillon scene is very different than it was when Omega’s 1947 prototype hid its tourbillon behind a solid case back as part of a largely undecorated movement. It’s now the symbol of haute horlogerie, often in watches costing as much as a house, and almost every high-end brand has made it a major part of their halo-product offerings. Even more notable is that brands are now trying to make “affordable tourbillons”: Stroll through the halls of the Hong Kong Watch & Clock fair, and scores of Chinese brands are offering tourbillons for far less. Even brands like TAG Heuer and Frederique Constant have made headlines with Swiss Made tourbillon watches costing under $20,000.

The brilliant idea of displaying the highly animated tourbillon on the front of a watch is claimed by Franck Muller in a piece from 1984 (before his eponymous brand was even established). Now it’s the norm, and tourbillon-equipped watches are often accompanied by a high level of finishing, as well as avant-garde designs meant to dazzle as they show off the delicate mechanics.

While still a relatively rare feature, tourbillons are today included among high-end watches, diminishing their novel and exotic appeal. Unnecessary, overly complicated, inefficient, expensive, and technically anachronistic? Yes, but they are also nothing short of eye candy, as well as technically fascinating representations of history and craftsmanship. Mechanical watches themselves could be described in the same way.

October 22, 2019 / Comments Off on Why Did This Understated Omega Watch from 1947 Sell for Over $1.5 Million?
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How the ‘Freak’ Introduced Silicon to Mechanical Watchmaking

Welcome to “Watches You Should Know,” a bi-weekly (the once-every-two-weeks kind) column highlighting little-known or notable watches new and old that have interesting stories or have had a surprising impact on the industry.

Who says the mechanical watch industry is stuck in the past? The same incredible material that has made the computing revolution possible is also impacting the world of the tiny spring-powered machines that inefficiently and expensively display the time on our wrists — but which are somehow enchanting. That material is silicon; and when the historic Swiss watch brand Ulysse Nardin introduced the first watch to incorporate it in 2001, called the Freak, it was met with skepticism and controversy.

Less than two decades later its use is widespread, and it promises to be the watchmaking material of the future. Why is silicon such a good material for watchmaking? To begin with, it’s for some of the same reasons that it’s useful in microchips and solar cells, but silicon is beneficial for other reasons that are pretty specific to watchmaking.

Terms to Know: When people in some parts of the world say “silicium” they mean the same thing as silicon, but “silicone” (with an -e) is something totally different.

Traditional watchmaking materials like steel have inherent properties that have provided watchmakers challenges for centuries. Temperature and magnetism can affect a movement’s timekeeping performance, and friction from interaction between parts eventually causes significant wear. Silicon is unaffected by any of these problems. Since silicon is so hard, it obviates the need for the lubrication traditional watch movements require — and that alone makes a huge impact on movement health and longevity, in part because oil ages as well.

For those reasons, as well as its extreme light weight, silicon is ideal for watch movement components like those involved in the escapement, the part of the watch that regulates timekeeping. In addition to these qualities, critically, silicon is also a material that’s inexpensive and widely available. However, that doesn’t mean that it’s making mechanical watches less expensive, at least for the time being: Working with silicon requires expertise and equipment outside watchmaking’s traditional wheelhouse. Unlike metal, silicon (a metalloid) is also brittle. Needless to say, incorporating silicon into mechanical watch movements also required significant research and development.

2001 Ulysse Nardin Freak

In 2001, Ulysse Nardin caused a stir when they released the Freak using silicon in its escapement, but also with a totally avant-garde concept. The use of silicon didn’t necessitate the Freak’s audacious design, but it was an appropriately outlandish way to introduce the controversial material. What makes the Freak so freakish? Most of the watch’s movement itself forms the minute hand, and the mainplate (with an arrow on it) rotates and forms the hour hand. The time is set by turning the bezel, and the movement is wound by turning a case back bezel. In other words, it aimed to rethink a number of fundamental watch features.

Since the introduction of the first Ulysse Nardin Freak, the brand has continued to build upon the concept with an entire line of fascinating and increasingly out-there Freak watches. However, silicon is no longer controversial and has been enthusiastically adopted across the watch industry. Particularly used for its antimagnetic properties in balance springs, it’s now a premium material that prestigious brands like Rolex, Patek Philippe and Omega proudly emphasize. The Swatch Group has even begun equipping some of its inexpensive 80-hour-power-reserve movements with silicon hairsprings.

Ulysse Nardin “Flying Anchor Escapement”

Silicon is even providing watchmakers with new, cutting edge solutions that transcend the traditional escapement as in Zenith’s Defy Lab watch, which beats at 15Hz and is able to achieve unprecedented accuracy for a mechanical watch. Research and development of silicon in watchmaking continues, and promises benefits for accuracy, stability, durability, and even affordability in the future. It’s an exciting material for a wide range of reasons, not least for giving traditional watches room to grow into the century ahead.

September 24, 2019 / Comments Off on How the ‘Freak’ Introduced Silicon to Mechanical Watchmaking
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