LIST: Ultimate transparency — Hublot’s sapphire evolution, in 14 watches
First things first, what is sapphire crystal? Essentially, it’s the same stuff used to make a watch ‘glass’ and display casebacks, formed by crystallising aluminium oxide at very high temperatures to create an extremely hard material. Roughly speaking, it mimics what Earth has taken 400 million or so years to do, to form natural sapphire gemstones. For sapphire-cased watches, the middle, bezel and back are milled from solid blocks of the material. Because it’s almost as hard and scratch-resistant as diamond (9 on the Mohs scale, as opposed to 10 for diamond), the task of milling it into the complex shapes required is much more easily said than done. Indeed, sapphire crystal can be cut only by diamond. Harnessing the knowledge it gained from developing a milling technique for Magic Gold (another hugely challenging material), Hublot works with a Swiss specialist as part of an exclusive partnership to develop the sapphire material. Speaking at Baselworld 2016, Ricardo Guadalupe, Hublot’s CEO, said that the rationale for using the material was to show off its in-house calibres – and that would also determine the choice of models that would be given sapphire cases. 1. 2016 MP-05 LaFerrari After 18 months of development…
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Now, if you’ve watched my review of the Tudor S&G you’ll know that I’m #team2tone all the way, but the thing is, I don’t *really* know how to wear it. I mean, I think I’d be OK in more formal settings — just pair it with a suit and away you go, but in every other part of my life — not so sure. I’ve got two-tone anxiety, and I’m sure I’m not the only one. Because, much as we’re all aware that the mix of precious and plain metals is, once again, en vogue, our awareness of it, and how to wear it, is still stuck in the 1980s. So I thought it was time to bring in the big guns, in the form of David Meagher. David, aside from being editor of The Australian’s WISH magazine, is a bastion of good taste and a sartorial safe harbour. He’s also of a vintage to have experienced the two-tone trend last time it was cool, so he’s in a unique position to tell us how it was done and how it should be done. Now David, I don’t think it’s too forward of me to suggest that you might have…
Earlier this year I found myself in London sitting in the office of Paul David Maudsley, in the Phillips Office at Berkeley Square, discussing the finer things in life. Now, when you pop in for tea with the international specialist of the London Watches department at Phillips auction house your expectations in regards to what’s in the safe sitting by his desk are pretty damn high. And, let me just say right away — they were most definitely met. At the time, March 2017, Paul was still finalising the catalogue for an upcoming auction, which the world now knows as the Crosthwaite & Gavin Collection. For those of you outside of the vintage Heuer world, Richard Crosthwaite and Paul Gavin are distinguished collectors, authors, and respected vintage Heuer authorities. For both Crosthwaite and Gavin, collecting watches is a passion, driven by two core values — condition and rarity. The pieces I handled all truly were world class, in both condition and rarity. Aside from this, this particular auction focuses on the period between 1962 and 1982, otherwise known as the ‘Jack Heuer Era’. I’m by no means an expert on vintage Heuer, but fundamentally this was the period when Jack…