Roger Dubuis

What a Great Night!!!!

Last night I had the good fortune to attend a spectacular Roger Dubuis event in downtown Chicago. The highlight of the evening, in addition to the watches, was meeting Roger Dubuis as well as other avid watch enthusiasts and collectors. Mr. Dubuis is a very interesting man and he told stories of how he first became interested in watches and of his time as a master watchmaker at Patek Philippe. I was surprised to learn that this was his FIRST time in the USA.

I was very impressed with the new Roger Dubuis offerings. Some of the watches are a bit too large for my smallish wrist but there is no denying the quality and fantastic design of their pieces. My favorite pieces were the La Monegasque Chronograph and Mr. Dubuis personal Perpetual Calendar GMT with the straight line (Day, Month, Date) display. I also really liked the La Monegasque tourbillion with large date and power reserve. I was hoping to see the La Monegasque Perpetual Calendar but unfortunately one was not available. I did not have a chance to take pictures of the watches as I spent my time chatting with some very nice folks. For those of you not familiar with Roger Dubuis, I suggest taking a serious look at these timepieces as they are really top notch.

I think most collectors will also appreciate the new program RD recently rolled out which allows customers to customize watches. In essence, you can purchase any of the pieces in their current collection and RD can customize dials (including producing enamel dials), cases can be engraved, hands can be changed out, etc. I know several other companies offer similar programs but I got the impression that RD would be willing to do virtually anything the customer requested which is super cool!!!

I wore my Roger Dubuis Hommage H37 in Palladium to the event as I wanted to find out a little more about the history of this watch. I think Mr. Dubuis was very surprised to see this watch. He said, through his translator as he does not speak English, that this is one of the very first pieces he and Carlos Dias created. There were only 4 employees at Roger Dubuis when the watch was made in 1996 and there is a high probability that he worked on this very watch himself (production and assembly). Mr. Dubuis also verified for me that this watch was one of the first hundred pieces produced by the brand and it was made before he started his limited edition series of 28 pieces. He was unsure how many were produced but it was very few, especially in palladium. The RD staff (who were excellent hosts) are going to see if they can find out how many were made by reviewing documents back at the headquarters in Geneva. Mr. Dubius also confirmed that this watch pre-dates the in house movements at RD. It is indeed a Lemania 8815 that had to be completely reworked to qualify for the Geneva Seal. In the early days of the brand they did outsource movements, I believe he said 4 different movements, and reworked/refinished them to Geneva Seal standards. It also has an unusual marking on the rotor that only existed on very early pieces and was subsequently dropped when production was ramped up. Mr. Dubuis said it had no special meaning that it was simply a design element but I rather like it. Finally, I was able to get the original box signed by Roger Dubuis which I think is a nice thing to have.