Restoring my Great-Grandfather's Omega Seamaster
We all have those knick-knacks lying around that get forgotten. Dried-up sharpies, matchboxes, and screwdrivers are the common offenders in my household, however there had always been one outlier. A small, unassuming wristwatch had been sitting in an antique drawer for at least 20 years. Freshly into my 20s, I landed a job that meant I couldn’t have my phone on me for the length of the shift, and there was hardly a clock in sight. I had the very new issue of a watch being a necessity, so I went and found the cheapest watch I could get. After two weeks, what had cost $10 became worthless when the hour, minute and seconds hands all snapped off. Suddenly, I remembered the stopped watch in the drawer. To my surprise, when I rummaged it out of the mess of cables and foreign coins, I actually recognised the brand. An Omega Seamaster. Although I knew little about it, I knew it was special. I asked my dad if he remembered any details, and he said my great-grandfather had bought it. That’s about it. Being a DIY-oriented person, I launched myself into research in an attempt to fix it. I quickly realised…
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Franck Muller is known as the Master of Complications, and for good reason. Almost none of the watches produced by the Genevan watchmaker are straightforward, with watches that run backward, hour hands that jump around the dial, and a host of other marvels of mechanical engineering that both surprise and delight. This flair for the complex is seen clearly in the Franck Muller Master Banker collection, a family of watches with a tonneau-shaped case that houses a movement capable of showing three time zones at once – perfect for the international finance professional tracking the global markets. The elegant curves of the barrel-inspired case shape comfortably wrap around the wrist, and despite the 44mm x 53.7mm specifications, would wear comfortably on the wrist of a suited money manager. The inspired movement design is evident from the two sub-dials placed at 6 and 12 o’clock, which both offer a pair of hands that track the hours and minutes of independent time zones from the centrally mounted main handset. This three-fold timekeeping function is also remarkably simple to use, only requiring the single crown on the left-hand side of the case to operate. Offering even greater insight into the complexity and intricacy…
If you missed Part I of the Aldis Hodge interview yesterday, you can find it right here. In Part 2, we get to the core of it. What is Aldis Hodge doing in watchmaking? How did he start? And where is the journey going? Lastly, perhaps most importantly, WHEN will see watches with ‘Aldis Hodge’ or some such variant, on the dial? Settle in, put the kettle on, or decant a bottle of good red. Here is your Tuesday-long-read. Enjoy. So many questions, all orbiting around a central one; how the hell did Aldis Hodge get so deep into watches? It turns out it’s a hard one to properly answer; It starts with his mother, and one of those sayings mothers say: “‘I remember my mom jokingly saying that the mark of a good businessman was good shoes, a good suit and a good watch'”. I thought, I can get the shoes and a suit, but I can’t get the watch. My mentality for certain things, because money wasn’t always available, was that if I like it I would have to make it in order to get it. This is why I started designing my blueprints for my first house when I…
Last week, Nick Kenyon and Luke Benedictus got into a horological war of words over the rights and wrongs of the humble NATO strap. Luke took a defensive why-the-hell-not approach while Nick stuck to the purist’s line that some things must remain sacrosanct otherwise the whole of civilisation will go to pot. We then threw this head-scratcher out to the Time+Tide community on Facebook to canvas the views of the people. The results were mixed to say the least. “No, it’s naff like no socks with a suit and shoes,” insisted Martin. “If you still hold that a formal dress watch should be a slim, elegant two-hander… you just wouldn’t, would you?” said David. But other people took a more lenient view. “I think it depends if you’re trying to casually wear it,” said Jeffrey. “Some cases you can dress down a watch.” “Wear whatever you want, whichever you want,” agreed John. “No need to follow the heard.” The Verdict – Crime This week the poll on Instagram was much closer than the bloodbath last week, with the vote split 52% considering it a crime and 48% in the camp of sublime. Stay tuned for this week for colourful watches.