Worn & Wound
The Ruhla UFO: A Memento of Mod and The Cold War
The Gebhard Duve-designed Audemars Piguet Disco Volante 5093 took the horological world by storm in the mid-1950s, and there’s no denying that it remains an exemplar of well-executed watch design today. With the combination of the ongoing Space Race and Mid-century futuristic design movement came an influx of wildly shaped and uniquely proportioned wristwatches throughout the middle portion of the 20th century. One of the most popular designs was the UFO, with brands like Omega, Timex, Zenith, Gruen, and Ruhla employing this case architecture in their 1950s, 60s, and even 70s catalogs. While I’ve had the chance to own a Timex UFO model and handle an Omega Dynamic, it’s the Ruhla you see pictured above that really caught my eye. Why? Let’s dig in. Brief History of Ruhla and The UFO Model Ruhla’s watch production, initially named “Gebrüder Thiel GmbH,” began in 1892 with its “Fearless” pocket watch, becoming the first mass-produced timepiece put to market. Fast forward decades later to 1952, and the company is renamed “Uhren und Maschinenfabrik Ruhla,” or Ruhla for short, and continues production of watches and movements for both the domestic East German and international markets. Ruhla quickly found great success throughout this era, with their plant becoming one of, if not the, world’s largest watchmaking factory. By 1963, the Ruhla logo seen on my UFO example was applied to all the company’s domestic models and was used until the brand’s closu...
