Well here we are, the final Basel report. Finishing with two of my favourite Independent Watchmakers, both ironically not located in Switzerland, which may or may not have anything to do with their consistent production of quite opposite in terms of style, lovely watches for our enjoyment. Stepan Sarpaneva has finalized the Korono K0, his version of a dive watch. Marco Lang has created a subtle version of his Friedrich August 1st watch, yet it contains a unique movement, the mainplate and bridges being fossilized mastodon ivory!
First up was Stepan:
The new all SS K0 Korona, 46mm.
The SS K0 Korona with DLC bezel and crown.
The all DLC SS K0 Korona, a great looking watch.
Close up of all DLC SS version.
Love that crown!
The solid back of K0 Korona, it is after all a sport watch!
The other pieces I had seen previously, but thought them worth remembering as they are stunning. The Korona K3 Northern stars, which Stepan makes in either polished SS, Matt DLC SS or 18k R.G. or W.G. It is stunning in any variant!
Here is this stunning blue dialed and RG moon version of the Korona K3 Northern lights.
On the wrist, a lovely piece.
The RG variant, another lovely piece, and one that I could easily own myself.
The pair of beauties...
The back of the Korona K3 Northern Lights.
My two favourite versions of the Korona K0, love those blue dial elements.
The Korona K1 SS with the rustbrown dial.
And one of the more unusual watches, Stepan's amazing Korona Moonshine, which has the hours on a revolving disc, read at the bottom of the dial, together with the moonphase that slides across the opening also behind the hour disc. A very interesting piece by Stepan! I happen to love it and when he showed me the prototype in Basel 2 years ago with slight trepidation, I strongly suggested he put it into production. Here it is:
Apologies, not my best effort at photographing this lovely watch. The silver Moonface is now Stepan's signature logo. A cool look and quite sublime.
Leaving Stepan's stand, I wandered across the aisle and met up with Marco Lang, who was there with his sister and colleagues. I had heard about Marco's project from him a while back when he visited me in Solana Beach last autumn, and was not aware of how it might look, only that fossilized Mastodon ivory was to be used in the movement. I was quite shocked to be presented with this lovely & elegant version of the Friedrich August 1st with the arabic numeral 3 layer enamel dial and new for me, blued steel Louis XV hands. Upon turning it over, I was confronted with a lovely creamy warm caliber, using traditional wheels, jewels in chatons etc as in the Caliber I from Marco, except the plates, bridges & cocks are made from the fossilized ivory. I suspect it is unique in todays modern watchmaking. Marco told me that he got the idea from an old pocketwatch that used some form of ivory for the bridges & plates. The small series will be only 25 pieces.
The lovely 18k RG Friedrich August I with the enamel dial.
Here you go, Marco says the tricky part is in making the parts due to the inherent flexibility of the fossilized ivory compared to the brass in his standard calibers.
Here you can see the grain structure of the ivory a bit better in this light.
Another view of the sublime Friedrich August I.
While at the AHCI stand, Thomas Prescher introduced us to a young man from Japan, who is a student of another AHCI candidate Masahiro Kikuno. This young man had made his first watch, an extra-ordinary Tourbillon. Not delicate, but certainly a marvelous effort and huge kudos to him for making a wrist watch in the first place and a tourbillon to boot! Bit of a contrast to the preceding piece from Marco though in terms of styling...
Here is the tourbillon by Shuhei Imose:
Cased in a gold plated brass case to start, the single tourbillon is designed as an inline going train caliber.
The back is a bit plain for my taste, then again that is the aesthetic he is going for!
Not great lighting I'm afraid, but you get the idea.
Some notes from the maker, clearly laid out for use to see. Quite helpful as his English was fairly limited.
I then ambled over to the cafe adjacent to the AHCI and had a brief meeting with the Habrings, Maria & Richard. They were present in Basel to meet with some clients and also some of their vendors and I suspect their clients in the watch business that use the HABRING² expertise for movement and complete watch development. I was shown images of the recently released Doppel2 split seconds chronograph, based on Richard's original design from his days at IWC, but improved and updated. This small series of 20 watches is being made somewhat unusually for HABRING² in a greater number than the standard 12 per year of any model, due to the fact that it is the 20th Anniversary of the design. It is a superb looking watch, and one that will have many takers I'm sure!
Here are their images recently sent over:
Love the galvanic blue dial with the silver subzones, reminds me of my old Carinthian Sports Chrono with a similar dial, and then adding to it the orange second hand and matching stitching is my type of watch! I'm excited to see it live here in the store. I will only get a small allocation though, so don't wait to long to get a deposit in!
As is typical with the HABRING² calibers, they are finished to a fairly basic level, choosing to not go in for the elaborate and lovely, but much more expensive, hand finishing that many of their colleagues spend time doing in the Independent watchmaking world. They can do it, but find the majority of their clients prefer it this way.
So "Here endeth the lesson" as my old school master in England used to say to us small boys. It is done, Baselworld 2012 was fascinating as always. Plenty of new pieces and people to meet. At this narrow segment of the horological world, much to be happy about and I continue to be impressed with what I see and experience with these wonderful people who create my type of micro-mechanical art, for all of us to appreciate. Thank you for joining me on this journey and I appreciate the kind words many of you have expressed over the past 2 weeks.
Cheers,
Tim