Zenith Baselworld 2012 Novelties Report

The focus of Zenith’s offerings this year were perfectly clear even to the least sensitive and uninitiated person once the booth was entered: The company reconsidered its rich history in aviation timekeeping which encompassed board instruments like altimeters and dash clocks as well as precision pilot’s watches with chronograph and/or world time function. The watch on the left is the timepiece worn by Louis Blériot during his heroic first crossing the Channel – 40 kilometres of ocean – in a flyi

Espada The El Primero family gets a new addition with the introduction of the time-only El primero calibre 4650 B. Essentially it’s the famous calibre stripped of its chronograph mechanism – just like the ETA Valgranges movement is to the Valjoux 7750. The new movement retains the fast beat 10 vibrations per second, or 36,000 vibrations per hour as well as the 50h power reserve. For the launch of the new movement Zenith revises a history Espada collection. The novelty features a 40mm

Chronograph The legacy Zenith watch with a lot of design cues taken from the past. We were shown a 42mm El Primero chronograph in red gold with an appealing frappé ‘dial (egg-shell’-like in both colour and surface): An easy watch to wear, well proportioned and with a timeless design. It plays on the classical theme like Vacheron-Constantin, albeit at a more affordable price point but with equally high yet very different horological significance. If you can live with the logically flawed dial (su

For the female audience Zenith offers two new watches in a cushion-shaped case with either a moon phase (Elite-based) or a chronograph (El Primero-based) complication: The dial diameter is almost as large as the outer dimensions of the case, leaving four small ‘bezel-residues’ which are set with diamonds: Certainly beautifully designed and technically appealing, the watches look a bit derivative to us, with a case inspired by Patek Philippe, the hands by De Bethune, and the dial by R

Christophe Colomb Equation of Time A watch that at first was presented to us by Mr Nataf, in a - please excuse! - rather horrendous case design. That design we guess was in part responsible for the initial rejection of this watch by a large group of watch connoisseurs, and thus did the watch a disservice: The concept however bears a lot of horological thinking. Starting with the tourbillon, which aims to correct for impacts of gravity in a vertical position of the watch (read: escapement), the Z

Thanks for this post Magnus! I want need that Montre d'Aéronef type 20. The case, dial, hands the look perfect. The movement? No discussion, that IS perfect. The size,? Big but who cares ? But the Pilot big date and the Doublematic are amzing pieces too. This 'Pilot' line will imo have a lot of succes. IWC ... Watch out !