It’s easy to compare the Bell & Ross BR 05 collection to other steel sports watches, a market segment that is definitely a crowded one. But not all watches get better when they are crafted in gold. Joshua Munchow thinks the BR 05 Skeleton Gold really pops in the precious metal, though. See for yourself!
Peter Gago has what many people in the wine world think is the best job on the planet: he is chief winemaker for Penfolds, one of Australia’s oldest wine producers. Here Ken Gargett shares the history of Penfolds and Peter Gago and reports on tasting Penfolds’ latest flagship wine, the G5.
Many of you are likely to have come across at least a few heated discussions of “finishing,” a topic that seems to fascinate, and divide, watch enthusiasts. Like many people, GaryG’s starting point for serious watches was with a well-priced brand long known for its expertise in developing movements, justly viewed as offering good value for money – but not necessarily for the refinement of its movement finishing, at least on its less expensive pieces. Read on to discover what he has learned since then.
When the hammer came down at the Phillips auction and GaryG had become the new owner of an A. Lange & Söhne Pour Le Mérite Tourbillon, the feeling was one of complete joy, representing the culmination of a multiyear chase. What makes this particular watch so special in so many ways to him?
The Bovet Ottantasei Tourbillon is the brand’s sixth timepiece designed by Pininfarina, and the years of experience that the two brands now have working together shows. It truly is a sensational watch, but here Ian Skellern focuses on Pininfarina, a name evoking mystical status among anyone interested in world-class design and sensational cars.
If you were there, you won’t forget it soon. And if you weren’t, you are still going to be hearing about it for a very long time indeed. GaryG posits that the November 2021 Geneva auction week will be remembered as the point in time at which either the value of collectible watches reached a new plateau from which they only continued to climb or the bubble in prices for pieces from certain makers reached its most outrageous dimensions before deflating or imploding. Here’s what happened.
An email arrived: would Ken Gargett be interested in tasting an original prestige champagne from the popular house of Piper-Heidsieck? This is the sort of invitation he would crawl over broken glass to be part of and he shares his experiences here. Spoiler alert: Ken rates the 50-year-old champagne 99/100!
The most striking thing about the Zeitwerk is its incredible look that combines much that is familiar about A. Lange & Söhne and some that is less familiar. The Zeitwerk was a watch to fit the times 12 years ago, a new era of complicated watchmaking, inside the Saxon brand and elsewhere. And now comes the Zeitwerk Date, a complicated sibling with new-and-improved technology.
The new Reverso Tribute Minute Repeater is a fitting tribute for the 150th anniversary of Jaeger-LeCoultre’s first minute repeater and the 90th anniversary of the Reverso. When the repeater is in operation, its mechanics are an aesthetic ballet!
With the recent announcement that Greubel Forsey will be instituting a new program called Renaissance d’une Montre as of 2023, which will allow collectors to change anything they like about their watches, Tim Mosso finds it a good time to revisit what is perhaps the brand’s most underrated ultra haut-de-gamme option for collectors of modern watchmaking, the Double Tourbillon 30°.