Independent Chinese watchmaker Qin Gan has over thirty years of experience in antique watch restorations and has crafted numerous prototype watches with complex features such as flyback, tourbillon, automaton, and repeater mechanisms. He now launches his second model under his own brand, the sublime Pastorale II.
Now that you’ve made it to the final chapter of Tim Mosso’s custom bike build, you’re probably wondering how this exhaustively planned bike performs. Here Tim reveals what happened when the rubber met the road.
Denis has said of the 2015, that it “expresses more of the soul of a Bollinger millésimé than any other year. More opulent, more powerful, it exalts Pinot Noir. Uplifted by maturation in wooden casks, this champagne reveals the characteristics of an exceptional year.”
GaryG enjoyed the opportunity to check out three of his friends’ rare Patek Philippe pieces, all with salmon-colored dials: Reference 5059G-018 and Reference 3940G-029 perpetual calendars from Patek Philippe’s Vintage Collection and a unique piece Reference 5270G. He shares his thoughts and stunning photos with us here.
Humans have long had a fascination with the depths of the ocean, striving to go ever deeper, ever further, and ever faster by pushing the limits of the human body, technology, and advancing modern science. But like all things, we are often faced with limits. And the helium escape valve was invented to push one of those limits as watchmaker Ashton Tracy explains.
Some watches are so perfect there isn’t a thing you want to be changed about them. For Martin Green, this was the case with the Vacheron Constantin Traditionnelle Split-Seconds Chronograph Ultra-Thin Collection Excellence Platine. Apart from its name, which he thinks is decidedly too long. But a look through the display back more than makes up for that.
After each visit to Geneva, Thomas Brechtel adds a few micromechanical, handcrafted works of art to his personal long-term archive because they stand out. Fere are a few favorites from 2024.
Thanks to its bezel, as Dietmar W. Fuchs explains, the diver’s watch is a much more versatile timepiece than many people think. Aside from teaching you how to use it on land, in the skies, and under water, here he answers the perennial question of who made the first true diver’s watch: Blancpain, Rolex, or Panerai.
Roger Smith holds a special place in the pantheon of independent watchmaking, both on his own merits and as the man who worked most closely with the legendary George Daniels. While any Smith watch is rare, this particular Series 2 is unique: it’s the only watch in stainless steel that Smith has yet produced.
The long-term decline in secondary market prices continued over the course of last month. In this update, we cover the Big Three in detail as well as the performance of all key secondary market brands.