H. Moser & Cie Swiss Alp Watch Final Upgrade – $30,800
This $30,800 watch would annoy the hell out of me mashable.com proclaims. New watch alert! The final installment of H. Moser & Cie’s Alpine series – a mechanical middle finger to the Apple Watch – features a faux Spinning Disc Pointer mocking Cupertino’s app loading app. Back in the day, Apple’s interminable load times inspired us to call its multi-colored predecessor “the spinning beachball of death.” These days you hardly see the icon. If you wear this watch, you’ll see it all the time. Like this . . .
WHEN WILL IT LOAD? The Swiss Alp’s frustration-engine (a.k.a., second hand) peers through a dial made of Vantablack, the darkest substance produced by hand of man. Cool as that is in theory, in practice it turns the crystal into a mirror; you have to shade the dial to see that you can’t see anything. On the positive side, the Final Upgrade is funny! And the HMC 324 hand wound movement is stunning in both its appearance and temporal virtuosity. This I know because I bought an HM&C Swiss Alp watch. Review to follow . . .
Hamilton Ventura Elvis80 Skeleton – $2000
There are two Elvises (Elvi?): the rail thin 50’s rocker with his sharp-as-a-tack wardrobe and the engorged Vegas Elvis wearing tacky-as-hell jumpsuits. The Hamilton Ventura worn by The King fits squarely into the early Elvis aesthetic. (Click here for a previous post’s pic of The Tupelo Tornado wearing his Hamilton Electrics Pacer Ventura.) Suffice it to say, this new Ventura is fat Elvis, only worse. Not to put too fine a point on it, the rubber strapped VenturaElvis80 Skeleton Auto is one ugly sumbitch.
New watch alert! It’s even worse in black. The groundbreaking Hamilton Ventura didn’t have a legibility breaking sine wave running across the dial or lighting bolts connecting the indices. (Nor did the previous skeletonized version.) Why does this one? To partially obscure the mundanity of Hamilton’s ubiquitous H-10-S movement? The Skeleton’s ultimate sin: gleaming fake gold. Lest we forget, The Memphis Flash wore a Gerald Genta-designed Rolex King Midas. ‘Nuff said?
Louis Vuitton Tambour Damier Graphite Race Chronograph – $8,350
Speaking of ugly, illegible watches . . . Wait! “A bold case combined with serious swagger and eye-popping green accents makes it a bright spark of contemporary design in a world of homage watches,” Thor Svbaoe opines at timeandtidewatches.com. “Shy it ain’t.” I’m courageous enough to suggest that Mr. Svabaoe’s write-up on the Louis Vuitton Tambour Damier Graphite Race Chronograph is the best example of spin doctoring I’ve seen since CNN called press censorship “harm reduction.” Here he is live:
To be fair, the 46mm LV chrono is a magnificent example of unabashed brand boasting kitsch, if you like that sort of thing. And Mr. Svbaoe may be right: King Louis’ new watch could be a horological harbinger. As we emerge from the worldwide Coronageddon lockdown, prognosticators are prognosticating a transition into a second “roaring 20’s.” We’re talking unrestrained partying and profligate spending. Louis Vuitton’s bilious bauble is nothing if not unrestrained. And a thug magnet. One way or the other.
“a mechanical middle finger to the Apple Watch”
More an ironic toy for people that have won big on Apple stock and highly paid Apple employees, but if I was in one or both of those categories I would buy one (a fume, this version is too kitsch). Looking forward to the review.
This is my favorite small seconds display ever! That Hamilton sure looks like it was designed by a committee. I’m kind of relieved that the LV Diesel chronograph is not a chavtastic homage to steamer trunks and handbags of yore, not that I’d pay a hundredth of the MSRP for it.