Vacheron Constantin unveiled a collection that was noticeably devoid of big complications but is nevertheless excellent.
The Les Historiques 1954 Aronde follows the successful Americaine 1921 as another re-edition of a vintage form watch. This has an elegant double curved rose gold case with a curved sapphire crystal, matched with a guilloche dial with perpendicular godron segments. A watch like this could easily look feminine but at 45 by 31 mm it is a solid size.
Though not a grand complication, the Patrimony Traditionnelle World Time is the most ambitious Cottier-style world time I have come across. The world time mechanism allows the time to be set to half and even quarter hour time zones, which is why the cities disc includes obscure places like Eucla and well-known but little visit locales like Kabul and Yangon. These unusual time zones are indicated in red on the dial.
Despite having so much text on the dial, the watch is legible, partly thanks to the 42.5 mm diameter of the case.
Also clever is the day/night indicator in the centre of the dial. A sapphire disc, half of which is tinted grey, is placed over the world map on the centre. As the cities disc which is linked to the map rotates, the half tinted sapphire indicates the regions of the in light and those under dark. This is an intuitive and readable method of indicating day and night.
A more complicated but less novel new watch is the Patrimony Contemporaine Perpetual Calendar. This is a traditional, ultra-slim perpetual.
Finally the Quai de l’Ile line is now available with solid dials. I never warmed to the Quai de l’Ile but these new models are a big improvement over the open dials of the earlier versions.
Both the Quai de l’Ile automatic and day-date are available with the new dials; I think the automatic looks especially good. These are available in rose gold, titanium or palladium, with the option of mixing and matching the materials for each of the case parts like bezel, lug and case band.
But the Quai de l’Ile line also sees a new model added, the Annual Calendar. This too has a solid dial with the option of different case material combinations.
- SJX
This message has been edited by SJX on 2011-01-30 09:35:49 This message has been edited by AnthonyTsai on 2011-01-30 16:21:50