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At the recent premiere of ‘Spider-Man: No Way Home’ in Los Angeles, Benedict Cumberbatch, aka Doctor Strange, had a Jaeger-LeCoultre Master Ultra Thin Perpetual on his wrist. Elizabeth Doerr explains the WIS-worthy significance of him wearing this particular model, which calls back to an earlier film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
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To celebrate the 300th anniversary of the birth of its founder, Jaquet Droz commissioned a big, beautiful book written by Swiss historian Dr. Sandrine Girardier. Elizabeth Doerr reviews 'The Worlds of Jaquet Droz' here.
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Ken Gargett set out to review a wine that has been called an Australian First Growth, the Wynns Black Label Cabernet, and its flagship, the John Riddoch Cabernet. But it became clear to him that without providing some context and history in relation to Coonawarra that anything on those wonderful wines would be incomplete. And here he does just that.
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The Phillips watch auction in New York on December 11, 2021 sold a brand-new Patek Philippe Nautilus Reference 5711/1A-018, double signed “Tiffany & Co”. The hammer fell at a jaw-dropping price of $5.35 million. The buyer’s premium on the sale was an additional $1.153 million. Brendan Cunningham reflects on that auction result and the possible wider implications for the market.
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Seiko has always made it a point to deliver bang for your buck. And in recent years, the brand has been realigning its different collections with the aim of offering collectors exciting products in every price category. For the Presage, this means that there are now two tiers to the collection: Prestige and Basic. Martin Green takes us through a number of models from 2020.
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With the 2021 Formula 1 season's last race taking place this weekend, December 10-12, 2021, in Abu Dhabi, and Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes) and Max Verstappen (Red Bull) tied for first place, the heat is on like never before. The battle between Hamilton and Verstappen is, in essence, also a competition between the two watch brands who sponsor them: IWC (Hamilton) and TAG Heuer (Verstappen), with both brands benefitting from the battles on the track. Martin Green takes a closer look.
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J.N. Shapiro is the eponymous brand of Josh Shapiro, an educator turned watchmaker who specializes in guilloche. His latest watch, the Infinity Tantalum, is a classic three-hander with a small seconds dial designed in the spirit of George Daniels, Breguet, and other greats. The palladium dial is completely hand-guilloche and sports tantalum chapter rings. And, oh, that gorgeous style!
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As we race toward the Formula 1 season finale in Abu Dhabi on December 12, 2021, Elizabeth Doerr takes a look at Bell & Ross’s three limited-edition chronographs celebrating Formula 1’s Alpine F1 team, which have also been worn throughout the season by the team’s staff.
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Ineichen Zurich held two days' worth of watch auctions in Zurich and online November 20-21, 2021 with 198 ticking specialties that included a bevy of independent timepieces and two new world records for the Vianney Halter Antiqua. Get the results here!
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Ken Gargett takes a look at the new Bollinger Blanc de Noirs one-off, the B13 from the (unusual) 2013 vintage. And decides that this is no shrinking violet and that no one is going to taste this and start thinking how delicate, how elegant. It is a big, bold, full-of-flavor champagne.
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The balance wheel, the critical regulatory organ of a mechanical watch, is expected to deliver a consistent frequency with a tolerance of as little as 0.001 percent. With so much at stake, why complicate things by altering a pure and simple geometric shape? Why reinvent the wheel? Well, here are five balances that definitely did reinvent the wheel.
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A watch or a pen is often a traditional gift for an important occasion. Signature Moments, the first collaboration authored by Carl F. Bucherer with Caran d’Ache, is all about remembrances of things past as well as hopes for the future. These two companies celebrate this with a collaborative limited edition watch and pen set, only 188 of which are available worldwide, comprising Carl F. Bucherer's Manero Flyback Signature timepiece and Caran d’Ache's Signature rollerball pen.
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Martin Green is a big fan of the Bell & Ross BR 05 Chronograph and to date the blue-dial model has been his favorite. But that's now been supplanted by the White Hawk, which he thinks gives this military-inspired watch a more urban touch.
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Moët & Chandon is a champagne house deeply aware that winemaking is intimately linked to the climate and soil. Directly witnessing the impact of global warming on viticulture, Moët & Chandon is dependent on the protection of the environment for its survival, which entails the preservation of its vineyards and the natural ecosystem as well as sustainability in its supply chains. Learning from nature is tantamount. Here's how the largest producer in Champagne is working on it.
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Breitling’s new 2021 Super AVI collection highlights its ongoing commitment to a foundational pillar of the brand: aviation-inspired timepieces. Nancy Olson thinks that this collection embodies that sense of nostalgia for the early days of aviation when pilots relied on their watches as onboard tools.
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If you like watches at all, you have certainly seen wristshots and perhaps you have even posted a few of your own. Like the selfie, wristshots seem to be ubiquitous these days. But where did wristshots come from, why do they exist, and what are the pitfalls to look out for? GaryG shares a few tips on what he has learned works and what doesn't.
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The Zeitwerk was the watch that encouraged George Cramer to start following A. Lange & Söhne more closely, but it still took years before he finally got to handle one in the metal. And he became instantly addicted.
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To mark the fiftieth anniversary of the United Arab Emirates, Ahmed Seddiqi & Sons worked with Bovet to create an exceptional version of the 19thirty that stands out in its use of color. Martin Green thinks the green-and-orange color combination works so well he wonders why it isn't seen more (and why he didn't think of it himself).
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The GoS Blue Norrsken (whose name is Swedish for “northern lights”) is a masterful three-way collaboration honoring the fantastic displays of the aurora borealis as seen in the boutique brand’s home country Sweden.
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For the Panthère UAE Limited Edition, Cartier set the bezel with 44 brilliant-cut rubies. These stones surround the distinctive bezel screws that are one of the hallmarks of the Panthère model and add a generous dash of color, making this limited edition a true eye-catcher for Martin Green.
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How much time could one survive in space without a suit? Are there truly 24 hours in a day? Why could dinosaurs not live in the present day (shock: 'Jurassic Park' is complete fiction)? Where are most of the volcanos on earth? Is there a river beneath the Amazon? How long has it been since it has rained on the driest place on earth? And what percentage of the world’s species we have discovered? Here are 50 things you should know about the planet we live on.
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As might be expected from a collaboration between De Bethune and Ahmed Seddiqi & Sons, the UAE Hawk is absolutely stunning. In essence, it’s a DB27 Titan Hawk in a seven-piece limited edition but it is a touch more classical. What are the other differences? Martin Green takes a closer look.
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It’s easy to compare the Bell & Ross BR 05 collection to other steel sports watches, a market segment that is definitely a crowded one. But not all watches get better when they are crafted in gold. Joshua Munchow thinks the BR 05 Skeleton Gold really pops in the precious metal, though. See for yourself!
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Peter Gago has what many people in the wine world think is the best job on the planet: he is chief winemaker for Penfolds, one of Australia’s oldest wine producers. Here Ken Gargett shares the history of Penfolds and Peter Gago and reports on tasting Penfolds' latest flagship wine, the G5.
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Diver’s watches are meant to be rough, tough tool watches, and limited editions are made to cash in on a model’s popularity. The Bell & Ross BR 03-92 Diver Full Lum is both, yet disproves these paradox presumptions as Martin Green discovered after wearing this watch for a while. What did he think? It's lit!
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Many of you are likely to have come across at least a few heated discussions of “finishing,” a topic that seems to fascinate, and divide, watch enthusiasts. Like many people, GaryG's starting point for serious watches was with a well-priced brand long known for its expertise in developing movements, justly viewed as offering good value for money – but not necessarily for the refinement of its movement finishing, at least on its less expensive pieces. Read on to discover what he has learned since then.
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The Bovet Ottantasei Tourbillon is the brand's sixth timepiece designed by Pininfarina, and the years of experience that the two brands now have working together shows. It truly is a sensational watch, but here Ian Skellern focuses on Pininfarina, a name evoking mystical status among anyone interested in world-class design and sensational cars.
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If you were there, you won’t forget it soon. And if you weren’t, you are still going to be hearing about it for a very long time indeed. GaryG posits that the November 2021 Geneva auction week will be remembered as the point in time at which either the value of collectible watches reached a new plateau from which they only continued to climb or the bubble in prices for pieces from certain makers reached its most outrageous dimensions before deflating or imploding. Here's what happened.
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An email arrived: would Ken Gargett be interested in tasting an original prestige champagne from the popular house of Piper-Heidsieck? This is the sort of invitation he would crawl over broken glass to be part of and he shares his experiences here. Spoiler alert: Ken rates the 50-year-old champagne 99/100!
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The most striking thing about the Zeitwerk is its incredible look that combines much that is familiar about A. Lange & Söhne and some that is less familiar. The Zeitwerk was a watch to fit the times 12 years ago, a new era of complicated watchmaking, inside the Saxon brand and elsewhere. And now comes the Zeitwerk Date, a complicated sibling with new-and-improved technology.
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