I flew down to LA to meet Romain off the Swiss Air Zurich flight on Wednesday Dec 2nd, organising a car and hotel prior, I was comfortable in my plans. Of course arriving in LA I had no confirmation on me of my car rental, which meant I had to call a several car rental companies from the airport before I worked out who it was I was going to pick the car up from! Safely ensconsed in a huge car, that's all they had! I picked Romain up from the International terminal and we headed out into the 7 lanes of the 405 freeway heading north to Hollywood & Santa Monica. Fortunately the crazy LA traffic had not exploded quite yet and we were able to get most of the way to our hotel, which was right off Sunset Blvd. & 405, on the freeway. Once settled in we headed out to Santa Monica to grab a bite to eat, walking around the pedestrianized area was interesting, quite a change from when I attended GIA back in '88 at the Santa Monica campus. We found a suitable restaurant that served a great steak. One of the things that Romain requested was a good steak, as in Switzerland the prices for good beef are significantly more than here, to the tune of 3-4 times.
We had the opportunity to finally get to know each other and I was impressed by Romain's passion for design & watchmaking. Growing up in the Vallée de Joux and having a father and brother involved in the watch business, he was destined to find his way horologically. Trained as an engineer, he completed his MBA and went to work on designing & creating his own watch from scratch. He was hugely fortunate in being able to use the facilities of his former employer during evenings and weekends to make the prototype parts. CNC machine programming is one of Romain's talents and in todays watchmaking world a highly valuable skill to have. He has many fascinating ideas, that will come to fruition in the not too distant future. The Prestige HM collection is just the tip of the iceberg. His next watch, that I'm sworn to secrecy, has some features that will thrill. It will keep the R. Gauthier DNA, the back winding system, evolved to handle more complications. The case style will remain as will the concept of a wholly new movement, designed specifically for the second series watch by Romain.
I think that this concept of designing a new movement from scratch for each new watch model is something that will stand out in the crowd. Not that the Independent watchmaker world is crowded, but you know what I mean! The more common way is to design a base movement, which in of itself is a tremendous feat, then use that as a base with which to add complications to at a later date. With his first watch Romain wanted to show the watch world that he was able to design and execute a classical simple two handed time only piece with a unique fantastically hand finished movement.
The Prestige HM Collection, white gold version:
And here that wonderful movement:
As he is an engineer by training, he sees future complications as adding to horology in terms of being useful and helpful to timekeeping rather than just regurgitating the rather standard usual complications. The market will see whether or not he is right, I for one think he is onto the right track.
Satisfied, we headed back to the hotel to bed. The following morning I headed off down to Solana Beach to visit with one of the world's great rare fine gemstone dealers, Edward Boehm. In his quest for rare specimens he has visited many an exotic location, Burma and Tanzania come to mind as two places I'd love to visit. Amazing rubies and sapphires come out of Burma, and one of the loveliest green gems, Tsavorite garnet come from the Tanzania/Kenya border. Anyway, Romain spent the day being interviewed for an article and he got to visit Malibu, which is a great spot. We re-convened back in W. Hollywood at 3pm and I spent the next hour looking at the watches Romain had brought with him. Learning new facts that were integrated into the design was fascinating for me: having Romain explain and show me these in a relaxed atmosphere was hugely beneficial. I now have a much more thorough understanding of the design concept behind the Prestige HM Collection pieces. Taking some classical elements from Breguet, Romain has two quite differing styles of movement finishing, the first is his version of a frosted finish on the plates and bridges and the second is the more traditional finishing found in the Vallée de Joux and Swiss watchmaking in general, the "Côtes de Genève". I'll go into these two in more detail in a minute, but suffice to say they are both stunning. His dial is solid 18k gold with a hand guilloché textured finishing. Roman numerals finish of the classic look to his dial. The Prestige HM Collection is available in 4 classical versions of 38 pieces each and the same 4 but jeweled versions in only 8 pieces. The total collection will comprise of 184 pieces of serially produced timepieces over several years. Romain has told me there are 5 unique pieces using this same movement and case too. As a complete series, making a collection of a fixed number is quite rare. Staying with that fixed number is the key. It is often a tricky proposition and one that collectors are rightly upset about if the watchmaker "extends" the series after the fact...
The first option is an 18K rose gold case sporting a black guilloché dial. This version has the Côtes de Genève finishing on the flat surfaces, black polishing on the jeweled end cap above the escape wheel and superb anglage. This traditional version of hand finishing was done by Romain in order to cover any critics of his frosted finish, who might think he created that as he wasn't able and/or comfortable doing a very high end traditional finish. This easily proves his team's talent.
Image courtesy of R. Gauthier:
The second option is an 18k rose gold case sporting a champagne guilloché dial. This version has Romain's hand frosted finish, which is accomplished using a fine diamond dust that produces an amazingly sparkly frosted finish. Under 10x magnification, one gets to see the effect this finishing has with it's interaction with the light. This is actually a more difficult and time consuming way to finish the bridges and plates, as the surfaces have to be perfectly flat and even when creating this finish, as does the polishing surface. The anglage has a tremendous contrast and really stands out against the matt bridges and plates. I also love the way this effect gives a great 3D look to the movement.
Image courtesy of R. Gauthier:
The third option is an 18k white gold case sporting a silvered guilloché dial. This version like the rose gold with black dial has the traditional Côtes de Genève finishing. A great touch is the rose gold plating of the wheels of the train; it gives the movement a warm look and also contrast. Possibly the most conservative of the 4 executions.
The fourth option is cased in noble platinum sporting a grey dial, actually the direct opposite of the white gold dial. This piece also as the hand frosted finish on the movement. I think this is the piece I like the most, although the RG with black dial is a close second!
After this precious time examining the watches, we cleaned up and headed over to the restaurant in Santa Monica for an intimate dinner with some collectors from the LA area. We were treated to a lovely dinner with great conversation and a couple of killer watches being brought for show and tell! The most fascinating piece I've seen from a big brand was the La Tradition Tourbillon with Fusee chain. Now talk about an amazing piece of micro-mechanical art! It has quite an industrial look, with a matt finish Titanium cage for the tourbillon, yet is delicate and beautiful at the same time.
The other piece present which I love, is FP Journe's Chronometer Souverain. The line up in LA consisted of old friends and some new faces, a great mix and I look forward to more gatherings like this in the future.
The first fellows to arrive:
The team inspecting watches and chatting with Romain:
Dinner time, with Romain actively engaged in many discussion about his passion and work:
The stragglers, last to leave!
The following morning, we exited the craziness of LA for the calmer Northern California Bay Area, which has been my home for the past 18 years. The contrast in traffic is one that I'll never tire of, how you guys in LA do it beats me. My hat goes off to you that battle that traffic! Arriving in San Jose, we headed North. Dinner this Friday evening was to be in Burlingame, giving the San Francisco attendees less of a journey to make.
As it was particularly cold that evening, we were glad to be tucked away in a private room with two heaters to ourselves.
Dinner was delicious and the guys were able to spend time asking Romain questions about his current watch and the design aspects that are slightly unconventional.
Close up inspection of the goods and arranging the table shot:
Sorry for my poor effort at a table shot:
Closer up 1/2 and 1/2:
A couple of notable pieces from two great Independent Watchmakers, the H1:
Doesn't this execution of the venerable Simplicity look superb!
I think he enjoyed the time too, getting to hear directly from collectors, what it is that they appreciate and also giving him an opportunity to find out what needs to be explained better for the buyer of his art to fully comprehend his work. A valuable and enjoyable time for all concerned, just getting together to celebrate our collective watch passion is fantastic, when a fellow such as Romain is present, then that puts it over the top for me!
The Saturday was to be reserved for a couple of private collector meetings and as one chap pushed his appointment back to late in the day, it gave me the opportunity to show Romain some of the stunning Redwood trees we have up here.
Redwoods and Romain:
This is a very big tree!
Close up:
Our final stop of the day was at one of my favourite wineries, Ridge. Located up in the Santa Cruz Mountains, actually only 15 minutes up that winding road from my old home in Cupertino. Having been raised in the UK on the merits of Claret or Bordeaux being the only truly great red wine ( yes a slightly narrow minded viewpoint I'll grant you); for those wine lovers, Ridge Montebello was one of the reds involved in upsetting the French in Paris at that phenomenal blind tasting held in 1976, much to the chagrin of the French judges who had voted in it's favour! If you have a chance to try it, it needs some time so don't drink it too young, you will be rewarded with world class wine.
Romain up at Ridge Winery:
After two private collector meetings, we dined together for the final time this trip. Romain then headed out the following day back to Switzerland. A new relationship that I value has been cemented, and I look forward to working with Romain in the future, he has a tremendous passion and keen sense of horological history. These two factors alone will see him do well. His future offerings to collectors will also show what he is capable of in terms of creative mechanical design that is useful. Not allways found in the watch world.
In closing I'd like to thank Romain for making the effort to come out to California to share his passion and watches, and I look forward to the next trip.