The most common choice for classic dress watches has to be gold, but have you ever wondered where that gold originally came from? And by “originally” Ian Skellern isn’t referring to a gold mine on earth but the original source of the gold before it even arrived on our planet. Spoiler alert: it involves an explosion, a very big explosion!
Dunhill has been producing fragrances since 1934, soon gaining quite a reputation. Aimed at the higher end of the mass market, that’s where we find Dunhill’s aptly named Icon Elite cologne line. Martin Green explains how it measures up right here.
If Ken Gargett were to tell you that he is looking at one of the great champagnes, that wouldn’t really narrow it down for you. If he said it was a blanc de blancs then you’d be able to get closer. And if he said it had become a cult favorite in recent years, you might think he is talking about Selosse, Agrapart, Collin, or one of the other emerging growers. The champagne he puts under the microscope today is actually from small(ish) grower Pierre Peters and it is the flagship, Les Chétillons. Find out what he thinks about it here!
Out of all the “traditional” styles of hairsprings, the helical hairspring is Joshua Munchow’s favorite because it adds three-dimensionality to the watch. These oscillators are so rarely seen that if you are only aware of five watches with helical hairsprings you already know a significant portion of the modern watches using them. Here are Joshua’s favorite five.
Bond girls often dazzle us with their brains and beauty, but for the upcoming twenty-fifth James Bond movie, ‘No Time to Die,’ Chopard jewels are also set to do some dazzling. The Swiss brand will have some of its most stunning creations worn in the movie by Cuban-Spanish actress Ana de Armas playing Paloma, this film’s Bond girl. Martin Green fills us in on which diamonds will grace her character.
If a friend dropped by for a chat and a drink and pulled out a couple of these whopper Romeo & Julieta Maravillas 8 Cuban cigars, Ken Gargett thinks you would have an enjoyable afternoon, but probably not think a lot about the cigars. He thought the one he smoked was fine, pleasant and consistent, but no fireworks. And then there’s the elephant in the room: the price.
GaryG ordered a Hasselblad X1D. He had never shot a medium-format camera before, and the resolving power, color rendering, and ability to seemingly wrap light around a subject completely blew him away. So when Hasselblad announced that it would be offering a 120 mm macro lens for the X1D, he was among the very first to sign up. But did it make a difference in his watch photography?
Y-Jean Mun-Delsalle sat down with Bentley chairman and CEO Adrian Hallmark to discuss how the last 100 years have set the company up for the future and how sustainability and electrification have been established as the new frontier.
Madame Pommery might have had no idea what she was setting in motion so long ago, but Ken Gargett feels that she would undoubtedly be very proud of her house today. Here he goes through her namesake bubbly.
One of the great pleasures GaryG has of being a contributor here at Quill & Pad is that it gives him an excuse to set aside other priorities on a regular basis and immerse himself in the world of macro watch photography. Along the way, he has been asked by a number of folks to reveal techniques that he uses to create the images you see in his articles, so here he shares some of his tips.