Watchismo Times

We all know there are cool watches, classic watches and collectible watches -- but then you get to the world of Horological Machines -- in a class of their own.  If that doesn't make sense to you, MB&F watches are quite honestly the Umami, that savory taste you can't quite put your finger on but you know you gotta have it. Without naming names, you very well know what watches are sweet, sour, bitter and most definitely salty!  But what you don't know, that UMAMI is the taste that doesn't get old, it only gets better with each bite!




Horological Machine No.6 - now in limited "SV" editions, in sapphire crystal combined with streamlined red gold or platinum. The sapphire crystal alone requires 350 hours of careful machining and polishing, just for a single case - the equivalent of 2 months' worth of working days...

XERISCOPE: The Orbiting Mechanical Automatic Watch by XERIC

XERIC Watches: Stop strangers in their tracks with an unusual mechanical time machine beating on your wrist. Meet the XERISCOPE.

Xeriscope Campaign on Kickstarter

Xeriscope at Xeric Watches Website

Xeric Watches at Watchismo

For years, my brother and I combed the globe to bring the world’s most interesting watches to our customers at Watchismo.com.  Our work identified a glaring gap in the watch market – the need for a very cool & affordable mechanical watch – at a time when we were eager to act on our longstanding dream to create something that had not been done by anyone else. Together with our team, we designed the first collection of
XERIC timepieces.


Take a look and you’ll see why XERISCOPE watches by XERIC will stop strangers in their tracks for a glance at your wrist:

The Fully-exposed, mechanical movement that is the display: Enjoy viewing the machine on BOTH sides of the watch and reading the time via the movement itself.

Unique double-sided minute hand lives nearby, alongside a second timezone display and a power reserve meter that lets you know it’s time to keep moving.

Five colorways in a timeless-yet-modern design to suit any style and proudly pass along to the next generation.

A limited edition of 100 individually numbered watches per style for the early backers of our Kickstarter campaign.

Automatically recharges itself with the motion of your daily life: No batteries needed. Ever.

How did we finally make Mechanical an affordable reality?  We are a slim company, and don’t have a lot of red tape and added costs. Yet we do have a great deal of experience with watches that informed the design of a piece that would look as exceptional today as it will in a hundred years. Finally, we found a way to produce our creation at an artisanal scale… and we hope to keep it that way because our customers care to have the most unusual watch in the room.

We value Kickstarter as a way to reach those who share our dream of making Mechanical affordable now to the visionary and stylish people who care about them.

Know anyone who plans to leave their smart watch to their kids? Neither do we. Let’s not plan for obsolescence. Let’s be a part of something that was perfect to begin with, and only gets better with time. Join us by making XERISCOPE watches a timeless reality.




ABOUT WATCHISMO

Watchismo.com is carefully curated watch collection by brothers Mitch & Andrew Greenblatt, modern horological enthusiasts with a passion for unique timepieces. Purveyors of wrist-borne time machines since 1999, Watchismo is a singular source for unusual modern watches from around the world.

Mitch and Andrew founded XERIC Watches to bring complex, mechanical timepieces like the XERISCOPE collection to a broad cross-section of watch enthusiasts who dream of an affordable Mechanical. Together, the brothers have carefully curated the exceptional collection at Watchismo, which since 1999 has been a singular source for unique modern watches from around the world. XERIC Watches represents a natural progression of the business: from Curators to Creators of designs that reflect their experience, knowledge and passion for the truly unusual.

THE GENESIS of XERIC

2009: While living in Switzerland four years ago, Mitch began doodling rough concepts for very unusual watch designs and discussing an action plan with Andrew. The brothers agreed that the watch market was riddled with extravagant watches but held a gaping hole that they could attempt to fill, if only there were a way to make an excellent mechanical watch for an accessible price.

2010: They began connecting with watchmakers in Switzerland while attending the annual Baselworld watch expo. Mitch moved home to Brooklyn, NY, and then to the San Francisco Bay area, so that the brothers at last could work side by side.

2011-2012: With feedback from their discussions with manufacturers, Mitch and Andy refined their designs and decided to name their creations after Xeric Court, the street they grew up on. Their field research continued to highlight the enthusiasm for mechanical watches among a stylish, tech-appreciative crowd that was priced out of the typical high-end Mechanicals.  All they needed to complete the XERIC team was a visionary, in-house watch designer with extensive experience in every aspect of the production gauntlet.

2013: The brothers hired Danny to help finalize the XERISCOPE design and navigate the production process, knowing he’s succeeded with similar projects for other watchmakers. The team knew they had the right movement for the XERSISCOPE and a design that would celebrate every detail of mechanical timekeeping: the watch case would need to be open on both sides and the hour hand would be a direct extension of the mechanism. Andrew, Mitch and Danny developed five distinct colorways, packaging elements and a fulfillment timeline, applying their years of experience as watch authorities, designers, distributors and retailers.

The team identified a manufacturing partner with 30 years in the watch industry, with whom they created and tweaked several waves of prototypes before finalizing the fully-viable XERISCOPE prototype.  Upon full funding, production will immediately begin for 100 first-edition pieces in each of the five colorways.

All they needed to bring the XERSISCOPE to life was involvement from fellow enthusiasts for timeless thinking, in order to attract those with the same appetite for an affordable Mechanical. The team then cultivated a plan to connect with relevant audiences via Kickstarter, where original thinking is directly rewarded by those who share a dream.

XERIC Watches embody the art of timekeeping by fusing mechanical function with timeless form in a singular machine. Designed in California, XERIC watches are produced on an artisanal scale, making high-end mechanical features accessible to a broad cross-section of horological enthusiasts.

BRINGING THE XERISCOPE TO LIFE

For a company that has had worldwide retail fulfillment experience since 1999, meeting customer needs for a new product was no mind-blowing task; however, the XERISCOPE product line represents a new realm for an established business already catering to the desires of a global customer base.

Both internal and external factors are balanced by having a manufacturer with 30+ years of watch-specific manufacturing experience and a brand presence by an established authority in vintage and contemporary milestones in the world of watchmaking.

All next steps in production depend on expressed interest by consumers in the presence of an affordable Mechanical timepiece. The same manufacturers who meticulously developed the prototype through the finalization process stand ready to produce this series within two months, given notice to activate production procedures once funding goals are met.

Each Limited Edition XERISCOPE watch takes its place in individually numbered series featuring a surgical grade stainless steel case; a fully-exposed, orbiting 12-hour mechanical movement with dual timezone display; retrograde power reserve meter; and case-back window for observing the oscillating rotor. No batteries required -- ever -- as XERIC watches generate power by the daily action of your wrist.

 
Mitch Greenblatt’s career path as a visual artist spans the film, television, music and advertising industries. After receiving his first watch (ever!) in 1998, Mitch began collecting and selling unusual vintage watches via Watchismo.com, with special attention to mid-century modern design. Just a few years later, he established himself as an influential watch blogger and authority on the subject of modern horology, and to this day maintains friendships spanning the horological universe. Mitch brings his deep knowledge of historical watches and innate sense of style to XERIC Watches, where he guides overall creative direction.

Andrew Greenblatt is a born entrepreneur, with a lifelong track record of success growing seedling businesses to bountiful fruition. His experience launching a profitable personal computing company at the dawn of the PC industry is a testament to his instinct for finding a viable niche and for taking the right risks at the right time. In 2008, Andrew merged retail forces with his brother Mitch to focus on truly special contemporary watches, following his heart to drive insanely deep beyond avocation into a full-fledged vocation. Andrew is in touch with the customer base and keeps a creative and critical eye on retail market objectives for XERIC.  A passionate watch collector himself, Andrew knows how to translate an abstract concept to a concrete reality.

Daniel Hunsaker joined the XERIC team earlier this year to help make the XERISCOPE dream a reality. Danny is a watch world “insider” whose career has focused squarely on designing watches and managing product development from concept-to-market. Far from “square” though, Danny applies his sharp eye for detail and boundless creativity to create unique XERISCOPE designs and usher them through the production process. Danny brings an acute awareness of design implications for other aspects of the development trajectory.

I'm looking forward to seeing this in person at Baselworld in a few weeks!

"Thomas had a problem:
How to make the visibility of the tourbillon even better than his present watches.
The solution:
Just tuck everything except the tourbillon out of the way."

-Watchprosite

"A vision. That is normally the beginning of a time sculpture manufactured by Thomas Prescher. Guided by the idea to improve the perfect visibility of the central elements of his multi Axis Tourbillon Thomas Prescher composed a new breathtaking piece of art.

Only time, Tourbillon, calendar and oscillating weight are visible. The movement is completely hidden.

Place to hide the movement was found left and right in the case, hidden by the bezel. Because the space is very limited the parts of the movement had to be located on both sides.

Later, resting in a hammock the idea was born to create an automatic movement with horizontal swinging oscillating weight. To crown this exceptional piece of art, it was a logical decision to choose something special for the heart of this watch. The escapement with its beating balance has to be a flying Double Axis Tourbillon with constant force.

The idea to add a calendar to this creation came while observing some people entering a giant swing. They could move on the surface of the swing. Why not create an oscillating weight with integrated calendar indications and let the gravity take the calendar on the oscillating weight remains always horizontal.

Respecting the aspects of harmony was an important point. Two crowns were used to keep the beauty of symmetry with. One crown is used for winding and the other for setting time and calendar. Both crowns build the main symmetry axis. Now it was necessary to build the optical balance between the oscillating weight on one side and the indication of time on the other side. For that reason a three dimensional moon was placed between the two barrels, indicating the hours and minutes.
Finally, placed on a turning axis, held by a carrying arm the carriage is rotating around itself. These two synchronized motions create a gyro scoping image immediately taking full attention.


Photos by Watchprosite
Visit PuristPro for more details or watchmaker Thomas Prescher Haute Horlogerie website


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I'm looking forward to seeing this in person at Baselworld in a few weeks!

"Thomas had a problem:
How to make the visibility of the tourbillon even better than his present watches.
The solution:
Just tuck everything except the tourbillon out of the way."

-Watchprosite

"A vision. That is normally the beginning of a time sculpture manufactured by Thomas Prescher. Guided by the idea to improve the perfect visibility of the central elements of his multi Axis Tourbillon Thomas Prescher composed a new breathtaking piece of art.

Only time, Tourbillon, calendar and oscillating weight are visible. The movement is completely hidden.

Place to hide the movement was found left and right in the case, hidden by the bezel. Because the space is very limited the parts of the movement had to be located on both sides.

Later, resting in a hammock the idea was born to create an automatic movement with horizontal swinging oscillating weight. To crown this exceptional piece of art, it was a logical decision to choose something special for the heart of this watch. The escapement with its beating balance has to be a flying Double Axis Tourbillon with constant force.

The idea to add a calendar to this creation came while observing some people entering a giant swing. They could move on the surface of the swing. Why not create an oscillating weight with integrated calendar indications and let the gravity take the calendar on the oscillating weight remains always horizontal.

Respecting the aspects of harmony was an important point. Two crowns were used to keep the beauty of symmetry with. One crown is used for winding and the other for setting time and calendar. Both crowns build the main symmetry axis. Now it was necessary to build the optical balance between the oscillating weight on one side and the indication of time on the other side. For that reason a three dimensional moon was placed between the two barrels, indicating the hours and minutes.
Finally, placed on a turning axis, held by a carrying arm the carriage is rotating around itself. These two synchronized motions create a gyro scoping image immediately taking full attention.


Photos by Watchprosite
Visit PuristPro for more details or watchmaker Thomas Prescher Haute Horlogerie website


| Watchismo Blog | Watchismo Shop | Contact Us | Facebook |

Days ago at the Venice Film Festival, Jaeger LeCoultre presented (in a custom 2600 pound German Doettling vault shown above) by JL CEO Jérôme Lambert, the most complicated watches ever produced, the Hybris Mechanica 55 Trilogy.

via Perpetuelle

Regular readers of Perpetuelle Blog may recall that back in June First In Watches gave you the first look at the Jaeger-LeCoultre’s Hybris Mechanica Grande Sonnerie – a piece deemed at the time as the new “King of Complications” for its tally of 26 functions and 1300 components in one – yes one – single watch (if you missed this article go check it out now!). At this time we previewed not only the Grand Sonnerie but also the 2 other grand complications (the Gyrotourbillon and the Reverso a Tryptique that Jaeger-LeCoultre would be offering as a part of a 3-piece, $2.5 million set, complete with a 2,600 pound German-made Doettling safe (which by the way has a special sound system installed that enables the actual chiming of the Grand Sonnerie to be heard outside the safe even when it is securely locked!). The set was created in part to showcase Jaeger-LeCoultre’s greatest achievements over the brand’s long history.

At the time of our original article it was not clear to us what the significance of the number “55″ in “Hybris Mechanica 55″ was – but now we know. 55 is the total number of complications represented in this incredible trio of watches.

Now, as for those “26″ complications in the Grand Sonnerie (the left-most watch in the above photo)- we have seen Jaeger-LeCoulter’s official listing, which we present to you here:

1. Westminster Carillon

2. 4 crystal-gongs

3. Grande sonnerie

4. Petit sonnerie

5. Silence

6. Minute repeater

7. and 8. Flying tourbillon

9. and 10. Perpetual and instant calendar

11. Days

12. Retrograde days

13. Months

14. Retrograde months

15. Date

16. Retrograde date

17. Jumping hour and minutes

18. Regulation device with inertia-blocks

19. Strike power reserve indicator

20. Watch power reserve indicator

21. Secured incremental hours setting

22. and 23. Secured incremental minutes setting forward and backward

24. Striking mode selector

25. Instant minute repeater activation

26. Automatic modes’ switch

With such an amazing set of watches, there is so much to say, so little time to say it – but thankfully Jaeger-LeCoultre created a really cool website dedicated to the Hybris Mechanica 55 trio that says a lot already! The site is full of close up photos and explanations of the various components of thewatches, in particular the Grand Sonnerie – and so I highly recommend you check out it out by clicking here: Jaeger LeCoultre Hybris Mechanica Trilogy Website

via;
Perpetuelle First in Watches
Kronos

Related Posts at The Watchismo Times;
All Jaeger LeCoultre Stories


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By now, many are aware of BNB Concept and their work – after all, it was only a matter of time before people started to wonder where the likes of Romain Jerome, De Witt, Hublot, Concord, Jacob & Co. and Bell & Ross acquired their blisteringly innovative tourbillons all of a sudden. Jorg Hysek’s HD3 visionaries were the only ones to freely admit the origins of their gothic-tech complications from the start, but once people started spotting BNB’s trademark spiral-spoked escape wheel all over the place, the cat was out of the bag. Once was a time when people were reluctant to reveal the minds behind their rent-a-calibres – now everyone's falling over themselves to get a piece of the BNB action and the instant provenance it brings. As BNB attests:

“BNB wishes not to become a new watch brand, but rather a label of quality. Should BNB create its own brand, it would inevitably become a competitor to its customers.”

Unlike Renaud & Papi's selective austerity or Christophe Claret's mercenary dictatorship, BNB is a genuinely cool, relaxed community of eager young things with genuinely new ideas about how watches should work – with no less than five facilities in Duillier, Crans-près-Céligny, La Vallée de Joux, La Chaux-de-Fonds and Nyon at their disposal, all crammed full of the latest tools, CNC machines, electroplating and engraving machines, and rank-upon-rank of sterile assembly lines. What’s doubly impressive about BNB is that they make complete WATCHES for their 25-or-so clients – not just the multi-plane/dual-axis tourbillon movements they’re famous for. For a five-year-old outfit, that’s serious progress.

Members of the Confrérie Horlogere 2008-2009 and Mathias Buttet (CEO and founder BNB Concept ; founder Confrérie Horlogère).

From the left: David Rodriguez, Ranieri Illicher, Clara Bise, Mathias Buttet, Ken Koshiyama, Sabitry Montandon, Gabriel Salgado-de Arce, Brigitte Carneiro.

It was therefore inevitable, despite the abovementioned pledge, that as a fully verticalized entity, BNB would eventually indulge in its own vanity projects – albeit under an alternative banner, "Confrérie Horlogère". (Perhaps reminiscent of Robert Greubel and Stephen Forsey’s Complitime factory, which bankrolled proceedings before they unleashed their eponymous double tourbillon).

Confrérie Horlogère is a bit Opus, a bit Maitres du Temps, a bit Time Aeon – only the emphasis is on nurturing youngsters with ideas beyond their usual means. And in this first year, no less than seven talents and four almost-complete watches have been put on pedestals by BNB’s effusive CEO Matthias Buttet (one of the "B"s in BNB - the others being Barbasini and Navas, all of them formerly of Franck Muller’s Watchland - Buttet as a micro-technical engineer, Navas and Barbasini as prototypists).

In Buttet’s words:

“The Confrérie Horlogère, far from being a product, is an ambitious project to promote such values as work, creativeness, craftsmanship, community spirit, respect and above all freedom of women and men moved by the will to express themselves through excellence, as well as unexpected design.”

And I’m pleased to report that every one of Buttet’s fresh-faced prodigies have come up with equally amazing movements and watches... It really is quite incredible to see such a tranche of brilliance emerge all at once.

Every year, Confrérie Horlogère will select a maximum of 7 “graduates” to develop their own watch, produced on a very small-scale – no more than 10 pieces each. And unlike many flash-in-the-pan pantomime projects, which run the danger of costing more to fix and service over a lifetime than the watch itself (if indeed you find a capable-enough and willing watchmaker in the first place, once the flash-in-the-pan brand has gone belly-up) the CH timepieces will benefit from a lifetime’s guarantee. Buttet trusts his kids that much.

This year’s 7 “companions” are:

1. David Rodriguez, a Peruvian watchmaker, whose “la Résilience” tourbillon demonstrates sublimely anarchic finishing with Punk overtones that actually reveal through its scars and stitching the difficulties Rodriguez faced as an abused orphan on crutches who, finally, found in Switzerland and watchmaking a refuge. Metaphorically biographical watchmaking – surely a world first?



2. Brigitte Carneiro, watchmaker, with “la Face Cachée”


3. Ken Koshiyama, watchmaker, with “Racines japonaises”

4. Ranieri Illicher, watchmaker, whose la Passion à l’italienne micro-brand debuts with the “Bel Canto” minute repeater tourbillon – a chiming watch literally suspended in a bell, which also serves as the watch case – why didn’t anyone think of this before?!


5. Sabitry Montandon, watchmaker

6. Clara Bise, watchmaker

7. Gabriel Salgado de Arce, engraver and chaser of watch components, whose coral reef ImmenSEAty just defies all watch-finishing convention. Words can’t do this justice.


8. An eighth Companion has already been selected for the year 2009- 2010. His name is Jérôme Siegrist, a watchmaker who is already involved in an ambitious project that focuses on recreating and scaling down to wristwatch dimensions an extremely complex mechanism built, anachronistically, two centuries B.C. and salvaged from a shipwreck in 1901. Antikythera will be presented by the end of 2009, but you can get an inkling of what to expect-->here.




Beside these individual “Complications” watches, the Companions will all be collaborating on joint Confrerie Horlogère projects, either as small-series “Classiques” or one-off “Masters” pieces. So far, there’s Masters Clef du Temps – an ornately skeletonised vertical tourbillon movement (presumably derived from the one developed for Concord, but as usual completely original and unlike anything seen before) – and Classiques Chronographe Tourbillon Pulsion 1 (I’ve run out of superlatives….)





The Master watch

The Confrérie Horlogère’s Only Watch 09 (by BNB Concept) is “La Clef du Temps” (the Key to Time) – a watch created by Buttet in collaboration with the brand’s R&D team. It is the first timepiece created in the “Les Masters” collection. It is a working prototype of a sophisticated timepiece called “La Clef du Temps”, which will be produced in small series after the Only Watch 09 auction. It is an innovative tourbillon watch featuring a hand-wound mechanical movement with hour and minute indications, a 3-day power reserve indication (PRI) in a 120° sectoral indicator at 8 o’clock and retrograde running seconds at 4 o’clock. The retrograde seconds of 0, 30, 60 depict the rhythm of time as it passes, and the power reserve reminds you when to rewind the piece as it makes its 0, ½, and 3-day passage. Like a body, if you don’t eat properly your body doesn’t function properly, and so with the watch if you forget to rewind it.

“The funds from Only Watch are there to indirectly help the children suffering from Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy,” says Buttet. “So I thought: what is it that everyone hopes for? Everyone hopes that these children will live longer than expected. I wanted this watch to express this dilemma.”

Buttet wanted the piece to convey two very important and thought-provoking concepts associated with being a parent: Firstly, the idea that however rich you are, true luxury lies in the freedom to manage one’s time as one wishes; secondly, the watch has a sophisticated mechanism that allows the wearer to “adjust the speed” of his personal time by adjusting a simple three-position lever that alters the running speed of the hours and the minutes.


Hence
Position 1 the pace of time slows by half so that the true value of one hour is displayed as a half-hour on the dial.
Position 2 the pace of time stays at true/standard time.
Position 3 the pace of time runs at double speed so a true/standard half-hour becomes a full hour on the dial of the watch.

As Buttet says, “This way, pleasant moments can be made to last twice as long while unpleasant ones can be shortened by half while the ability to ‘return’ to true time is always there.” The watch’s extremely sophisticated mechanism allows the watch’s time indications to remain in positions 1 or 3 as long as its wearer wishes, since a simple turn of the lever to position 2 (the watch’s memory) resets the hour and the minute hand to the real time of day.

As Buttet sees it, it’s his way of extracting some form of balance from a seemingly unjust world that makes us feel that when life is good, time flies, but it slows to a crawl during the rough patches. As with a child with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy, the pleasure of the good times passes all too fast and the painful moments all too slow.

The movement is shaped like a stylized human brain because, according to Mathias Buttet, “Time is a sort of “state of mind” which is the result of the will of any single person. Not to have time to do something is, at the end, a personal decision and it is not at all something imposed by someone else. Every person decides if he or she wants to have the time to do or not to do something.” Moreover he adds “If you look at the figures on the dial you will see that they are mirror images of themselves. Some numbers are reflected face-to-face, showing the moments that are the result of the one’s will; others are reflected back-to-back: in this case, it is fate that controls your life.”

The futuristic case is shaped like a spaceship – ever searching for a better life, and the strap is composed of four rubber-clad steel strands. Lifetime warranty and the totally Swiss-made provenance of its every part and component are other characteristics of the “La Clef du Temps”.


LINK: Confrérie Horlogère Website
LINK: BNB Concept


All Alex Doak Post for The Watchismo Times


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