Some meals are memorable for the food, some for the company, and some for a watch at the table. And then there are those meals that hit the ball right out of the park by getting top marks in all three. Make up any story you like to explain how a very contemporary De Bethune DB28 and a very traditional Philippe Dufour Simplicity came to be sharing a bowl of molten cheese in the Swiss Jura mountains.
Waxing poetically about moon phases has gotten me excited enough to take a trip through certain “phases” of engineering excellence . Here we bring you the eight most accurate moon phases currently fitted into a wristwatch. Join us on this odyssey through space and time.
“Whether collecting art or watches, when I fall in love with something, then I need to understand, I need to research deeply,” Mo Coppeletta explains. “You may have taste, but if that isn’t backed up with knowledge then it is superficial.” Read on to discover how Mo got into collecting watches and which are his favorites.
I’ve been attending Baselworld for more than a quarter of a century now, so it is pretty hard to surprise me when I show up at a brand’s stand to see the new timepieces. But at Baselworld 2016 I was surprised by Seiko, de Grisogono, Chanel, and Romain Gauthier. Read on to find out what exactly these surprises were.
Today we have a horologically themed caption competition that involves one of my favorite brands: De Bethune.
The photo below was shot at SIHH 2016, and I have to thank regular contributors Simon Cudd and Joshua Munchow for posing as wrist models. I will not reveal who is wearing which watch, but regular readers are likely to be able to make a fairly educated guess. Leave your caption ideas in the comments!
It’s already been six consecutive years that I’ve had the delightful experience of going through SIHH week with several of my closest friends. Our closing discussions centered around four questions, which were focused more tightly on SIHH itself this year due to the inclusion of nine independent watchmakers: what watch did you think was best of show at SIHH? What was the worst watch of the show? What watch displayed at the show would you buy if money were no object? What watch did you see on display that would you buy with your own money?
Yes, you read that title correctly: the DB25 launched at the 2016 SIHH displays world time and a second time zone in a mysterious manner. And, yes, “mysterious” is a common technical term in watchmaking for a certain type of indication. And, no, this isn’t your run-of-the-mill world time watch. It is from De Bethune after all.
It will come as no surprise to anyone who has read my pieces in the past that I like a good jump hour mechanism. Actually, I love a good jump hour mechanism. There is just something about that instantaneous change driven entirely by mechanical means that fascinates me. And yet not all “digital” watches require the use of jump hours and minutes; some don’t even use a jump at all yet still read digitally. So today I want to break down a list of my seven (plus change) favorite “digital” watches.
The Saatchi Gallery on Kings Road in trendy Chelsea has played host to SalonQP in London for the past four years. It is a fantastic venue and a great place for the brands attending to showcase their wares.
What an eclectic mix of brands and watches on show this year, too! Come with me on a virtual tour.
Dear De Bethune,
Can I call you Thunie? Or, even better, just DB?
I have decided to place quill upon pad after all these years of watching you . . . no, I’m neither a stalker nor a star-struck groupie.
But more often than not you have intrigued, baffled, dazzled, and surprised me.
You do not remember our first meeting; how could you? You were just a baby, very different from what you are today. You had rather classic looks inside and out, but there was a je ne sais quoi implying that you might grow into something more interesting and perhaps flamboyant . . .