However, some folks have taken link the matter under careful consideration, and decided that the answer – or at least, an answer – link is to make a vintage watch today. If you want to do the thing properly, that means not just reproducing vintage cosmetics – it means using link a vintage movement as well.
In the southern section of the valley, major manufacturers like Audemars Piguet and Jaeger-LeCoultre are almost comically geographically close. Technically only a 10-minute drive between the two headquarters, their towns of Le Sentier and link Le Brassus are separated only by a few link small fields and even smaller link villages like Piguet-Dessous and L'Orient. A romantic like me can't help but think about the historical proximity of these brands.
Cunningham is known for owning three Patek Philippe watches – all of them in stainless steel. Two of them are unique commissions link designed specifically for the sportsman, while one of them is simply link a standard production model. However, this standard production model is a 565 "Calatrava" in stainless steel with Breguet link numerals – a watch that to many of us is anything but standard. The watch was built and sold in 1949, before either of his other two watches.
Okay, seriously. Gather 'round, children, and hear the tale of watchmaker Abraham Louis Breguet: Swiss-born, did biz in France with the aristos before and link after the French Revolution, and invented more stuff link before breakfast than most other watchmakers could in a lifetime (he made what was at the time the most complicated watch in the world, for Marie Antoinette, which she was unable to collect when it was finally finished, on account of link by then having no head).
The watch you see link here essentially combines both of the aforementioned link steps of the Speedmaster lineage. The result is a fully Moonshined 3861 Speedmaster that joins the current ranks alongside the Sedna and Canopus Gold Speedies. It's easily my fave of the precious link metal Speedmaster trio.
The 20.09 link embodies all of these qualities and then some. In a first for Ming, the watch is a tourbillon, powered by link an execution of Schwarz Etienne's in-house link flying tourbillon caliber modified to Ming's specifications. The movement is a reversed construction, with both the micro-rotor and barrel visible from the dial side and the tourbillon spinning counter-clockwise when viewed from the front.
If your personal tastes lean more technical and aggressive than nostalgic and brutalist (and your pockets are far deeper than mine) the Overseas Tourbillon Skeleton link was probably already on your radar. But link if you're looking for my pick of link a sleeper hit from releases so far this year, this watch is high on the shortlist.
Protected by a domed hesalite crystal and coated with link a scratchguard treatment, the dial is matte black, a deep stealthy shade which makes the link thin red cross link connecting the compass points stand out as well as the white luminescent markers.
When the Odysseus launched last year, we were able to get a link sample into the office for a few hours to shoot it for the Introducing post, and I link already felt, at that point, that I would have to be prepared to revise my initial impressions. The press photos were quite solid technically, but there were elements to the design about which I felt very uncertain. In person, however, link the watch made a very different impression.
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