baselworld

The best of times: BaselWorld 2013

With luxurious watch sales booming, the stage is about for a fair bigger and higher BaselWorld this 12 months. Over the subsequent 15 pages, we offer you a tour of the expanded halls and our choose of the stands

Apart from all of the thrilling new watches and jewels twinkling from its vitrines, what BaselWorld might be memorable for this 12 months is the sight of trade-fair veterans wandering around slack-jawed, turning their unfolded floorplans again and again confusedly. And never just because the beer and bratwurst tent has been replaced by one thing called Metropolis Lounge.

Thanks to seven years of planning, 22 months’ construction and an investment of CHF430m (£299.1m) – the biggest ever to have been made in Switzerland’s exhibition trade – a gleaming new elevated complex now spans Exhibition Sq., be a part of Hall 1 with the previous Hall 3. Along with all the things else, Messe Basel is now in a position to supply 1.5 million sq ft (141,000 sq m) of showground, with Hall 1 overlaying 796,555 sq ft (74,000 sq m) of this.

The upshot? A radically reshuffled floorplan, yes, but also a bodily embodiment of all the things that’s optimistic concerning the watch industry. As booming bastions of the horological firmament, Bulgari, Tag Heuer and Hublot have emerged from the darker realms of the complex to become BaselWorld’s new gateguards. And lots of others in addition to will boast model-new multi-storey stands, all exhibiting big investment and impolite well being.

“We are actually excited about Basel – it’s all change for 2013,” says Rox director Kyron Keogh. “New halls, new stands and a new time of yr – we expect innovation across all levels. We firmly believe the tide is popping available in the market and look to the watch business to paved the way.”

Even the UK’s smaller high-avenue retailers are seeing BaselWorld’s evolution as a bellwether for higher times. “It’s still tough out there,” concedes David Gillow, managing director of St Albans’ Galio. “Nevertheless, we battle on and once once more will go to to source new manufacturers and merchandise. The posh watch market is actually rosy in the intervening time and, regardless of ongoing price will increase from the main brands, there isn't any sign of it slowing down.

“There may be merely nowhere higher than BaselWorld to study concerning the newest commerce developments.”

Keogh agrees. “There is no substitute for that face-to-face evaluation, and that feeling you get when dealing with or viewing watches in the flesh. Fairly merely, BaselWorld is the sector’s fundamental networking occasion. It provides us the uncommon opportunity to speak to the key players in particular person, construct on these vital relationships and showcase our own model.”
Forewarned is forearmed, nonetheless. So earlier than you even take into consideration packing your bags, make sure you read the subsequent 15 pages to get probably the most in-depth preview of what to expect this yr. Simply don’t ask us the place the bratwurst has moved to.

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Every man’s choice: BaselWorld 2013

This 12 months guarantees a wealthy variety of trends in men’s watches: retro, futuristic, classical, sporty, neo-Gothic… it’s all going to be at Basel. Alex Doak selects some of Hall 1’s finest

Frédérique Constant Slimline Manufacture Moonphase
No, it isn’t a Patek Philippe Calatrava, however you’d be forgiven for considering otherwise. Frédérique Constant’s Slimline Manufacture Moonphase is a masterpiece of understatement, elegance and steadiness of design, and it’s also a drop-useless discount, featuring as it does the youthful Swiss brand’s in-home, or ‘manufacture’ movement, updated to incorporate a moonphase and circular date indicator in a slimline case profile.

Not only do you get a sapphire caseback on your cash, however you’ll be gazing upon excessive-finish ornamental touches similar to perlage, round Côtes de Genève and no less than 26 rubies.

RRP: from £2,530

Frédérique Constant Slimline Manufacture Moonphase

Frédérique Fixed Slimline Manufacture Moonphase

Tissot Navigator
Tissot is celebrating its 160th anniversary this 12 months, and in continuation of the vastly successful Heritage reissue line first launched during its 150th celebrations, father or mother the Swatch Group has chosen the Navigator to commemorate this newest milestone.

Perfectly suited to the current craze for both world-timers and retro styles, this timepiece was initially created to rejoice Tissot’s centenary in 1953, and remains an invaluable instrument for roaming businessmen. Merely set it to any one of many world’s major 24 timezones to read its time from the minute track on the dial. What’s more, it’s a chronometer-rated computerized motion, making the value tag a knock-down cut price.

RRP: £1,040

Tissot Navigator

Tissot Navigator

Hamilton
Jazzmaster Face2Face
Regardless of a line in stable utilitarian navy watches, Swatch Group’s mid-market Hamilton brand enjoys a heritage of outrageous anomalies – led by their Jetsons-esque Ventura pieces, but also peppered with one-offs such because the idea watch developed for Kubrick’s 2001: A House Odyssey.

This yr, in an act of sheer joyousness as well as technical prowess, we now have the Jazzmaster Face2Face – an oval watch restricted to 888 editions, which may be flipped, providing the wearer a alternative of two watch designs in a single, and two timezones. Brilliantly, each movements for all sides’s dial are automatic, lending a futuristic techiness, as well as a contact of zaniness.

RRP: £four,640

Hamilton Jazzmaster Face2Face

Hamilton Jazzmaster Face2Face

Bulgari
Diagono Moonphase
Watch consultants were profitable in predicting Bulgari’s whole absorption of loss-leading boutique brands Gérald Genta and Daniel Roth just a few years again, but have been somewhat much less profitable in predicting such fast acceptance of Bulgari’s newfound horological expertise by the diehard purists.

Yet another highly technical triumph from the Roman jeweller is that this, the Diagono Moonphase, which, as an alternative of deploying current Gérald Genta and Daniel Roth technology with a Bulgari badge, innovates by itself terms.

The timepiece’s champlevé lacquer dial frames a 5-lunar-phase arc at 6 o’clock, and the day by day advance of the moon is indicated by a hand that jumps from left to right when it is waxing, and from proper to left when it is waning.

RRP: E38,500 (£32,742)

Bulgari Diagono Moonphase

Bulgari Diagono Moonphase

Omega Sedna
Now Omega has nailed its revolutionary Co-axial expertise, the Swiss marque has been working on other high-tech advancements, which are pushing its brand positioning larger and higher.

For its newest innovation, Swatch Group has tasked its prime metallurgists and scientists with creating an 18ct rose-gold alloy whose reddish hue will final several lifetimes. Named after the Inuit goddess Sedna, stated to live at the backside of the Arctic Ocean, the resulting formulation owes its enduring copper hue to the presence of palladium.

This Constellation piece is the primary outing for Sedna, and is proscribed to 1,952 pieces, as per the gathering’s launch year.

RRP: £thirteen,510

Omega Sedna

Omega Sedna

Seiko Premier Kinetic Direct Drive
Removed from simply resting on its laurels as every man’s ‘first first rate watch’, Seiko has maintained a stage of innovation that many manufacturers would do effectively to emulate. It's celebrating a quarter-century of its self-winding Kinetic expertise with this mannequin. Not only does the rotor cost the quartz motion’s battery as you move your arm, however you can too energy it by turning the crown. Whenever you do, the retrograde energy reserve cleverly switches to function as an indicator of how a lot energy you’re imparting.

RRP: E600 (£510)

Seiko Premier Kinetic Direct Drive

Seiko Premier Kinetic Direct Drive

Breitling for Bentley
Mild Physique Midnight Carbon
It’s precisely 10 years since Breitling attached with Bentley and double-handedly defined the fashionable notion of the watch/automobile co-branding partnership – a model now enjoyed by brands from Bulgari and Maserati to Hublot and Ferrari.

The Breitling for Bentley watches were all the time at a far greater finish than the Swiss brand’s standard oeuvre, and this yr’s new Gentle Physique Midnight Carbon is not any different, boasting an extremely-gentle titanium ‘chassis’ coated with matt-black carbon, in addition to a dashboard-type dial that includes a 30-second sweep-seconds hand, permitting for highly exact elapsed-time measurement, down to eighths of a second.

RRP: £8,930

Breitling for Bentley Light Body Midnight Carbon

Breitling for Bentley Gentle Physique Midnight Carbon

Tag Heuer
Calibre 1887 Jack Heuer Edition
It was the round Carrera chronograph that set Tag Heuer on its strategy to becoming sports activities-watchmaker without equal. First launched 5 decades ago, the Carrera is all you’ll hear about from Tag this 12 months, and no dangerous factor. This Calibre 1887 Jack Heuer Edition pays tribute to the eponymous pioneering octogenarian, who spent the 1960s in the pitlanes, kitting out his motor-racing pals with Carreras and manning his precision timing gear at first/end line. The little brother of the new carbon-composite CMC Concept Chronograph, the asymmetrical case design comes from the Carrera Mikrogirder, and its case is pure Formulation 1 and aeronautics: black titanium carbide metal, no much less.

RRP: £5,285

Tag Heuer Calibre 1887 Jack Heuer Edition

Tag Heuer Calibre 1887 Jack Heuer Edition

Maurice Lacroix
Le Chronographe Squelette
Watches that Batman could be proud to sport have been on-trend ever since stealth wealth came in. Not even basic manufacturers like Maurice Lacroix have been resistant to the matt-black-on-matt-black effect. Its in-home-manufacture Le Chronographe Squelette boasts a deep, multi-layered dial, its three-dimensionality heightened by the bottom plate’s snailed architecture and the black screws’ distinction with the gem stones. Visible between the web of bridges are the gearing, escapement and even the column wheel.
RRP: £TBC

Maurice Lacroix Le Chronographe Squelette

Maurice Lacroix Le Chronographe Squelette

Longines Conquest Classic
The enchantment of Longines’ men’s watches, and the brand as an entire, has benefitted hugely from recent raids on the archives at Saint-Imier HQ, with the Legend Diver, Waterproof Wrist Watch and Twenty-Four Hours all reminding us of the brand’s incredible back catalogue. However the future is firmly in thoughts with the up to date Conquest Traditional line.
In the identical spirit as the chronographs launched as early as 1881 for the horse-racing lovers and jockeys of New York, the watches are devoted to race-goers who share the joy of the season’s most prestigious races, all sponsored by Longines, from Chantilly to Hong Kong; Dubai to Royal Ascot. All are computerized, and the chronographs are fitted with Longines’ column-wheel calibre.

Rose-gold mannequin pictured. RRP: £6,810

Longines Conquest Classic

Longines Conquest Classic

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She’s in fashion: BaselWorld 2013

Chanel J12 and Première
Flying Tourbillon
It’s been 10 years since Chanel first exhibited at BaselWorld, when it came to the truthful with the game-altering J12 White. Last year, Chanel also upped the ante for girls’s watches once more with its Première Flying Tourbillon, which proved girls’s watches might house serious problems with out compromising on looks.

This yr, those two collections are back with 2013 updates. For the J12, there are alternatives in white, black and the Chromatic Rétrograde Mystérieuse, which was created by Giulio Papi’s workforce. For the Première, the diamonds on the bezel are changed with pink or, our favorite, blue sapphires (pictured). A rather haute piece of horology.
RRP: POA

Chanel

Chanel

Omega Ladymatic
The decision to relaunch the Ladymatic with the Omega Co-Axial calibre 8520/8521 put this collection at the vanguard of brands offering severe watches to ladies. Nevertheless, for 2013, the Ladymatic is exhibiting its playful aspect.

The watch nonetheless has the calibre 8520 under the dial, but the dials and straps have taken successful of color. Dials come now in sultry grey, sky blue, vibrant purple or cheek-blush pink, and there's the choice of co-ordinating with a matching satin-brushed leather-based strap or permitting the dial to stand on its own by accessorising with a metal bracelet – an enormous development for ladies’s watches in 2013. Nevertheless, it is the grey with matching strap (pictured) that just edges it within the fashion stakes.
RRP: £10,550

Omega

Omega

Jaquet Droz Petite Heure Minute
Despite its heritage, it was Jaquet Droz’s acquisition by the Swatch Group in 2000 that basically introduced the model to the general public consciousness. Although a part of the Group’s prestige manufacturers, it seems extra outré than the likes of Breguet. For 2013, nonetheless, it has decided to riff on a development – the bracelet.

This elegant timepiece, the Petite Heure Minute, marks the first time Jaquet Droz has finished one thing for ladies in stainless-steel and one of the few bracelets in its overall collection. It has the eight stars and smaller time dial that Jaquet Droz is synonymous with, set in opposition to a sky-blue mother-of-pearl dial. It also has an computerized motion with a 60-hour power reserve – more than a passing nod to ladies who need diamonds and design integrity.
RRP: £12,600

Jaquet Droz

Jaquet Droz

Ebel X-1 in black
Ebel has been on a bit of a reinvention streak not too long ago and this stylish black ceramic number, the latest addition to its X-1 assortment, which launched in 2012, definitely embodies that.

At 34mm, it isn't for ladies who like their watches boyfriend sized, but for many who like their timepieces more female without looking too girly, it's the excellent piece of wrist candy. Though the black ceramic and stainless steel case contains a crown set with 15 diamonds, while the bezel boasts forty eight diamonds, it is not overly flashy and is the best transition watch from day to nighttime.
RRP: £4,400

Ebel

Ebel

Hermès Arceau Petite Lune
It’s been 35 years because the now-iconic Arceau model was designed by Henri d’Origny and this yr Hermès has launched a extra female 38mm version of the design, full with a moon part, the Arceau Petite Lune.

The dial is available in white or black mom of pearl (we choose the undeniably sophisticated black dial) and has the asymmetrical lugs, which replicate the curve of a stirrup. Consistent with a brand that is famend for its saddle-making experience, the strap is alligator – in indigo blue, elephant gray or black – and made within the firm’s workshops using its saddle-stitching approach.
RRP: £4,850

Hermes

Hermes

cK Stately
One other steel bracelet for the combination, this time from style watch model cK. This is from its Stately collection, which is considered one of its more subtle, rather than style-led, ranges.

Alongside the steel model, which comes with both a black or silver dial, there is the option of PVD gold or pink gold variations, both with a silver dial. And, thanks to cK being a part of the Swatch Group, the movement is ETA, a assure of high quality timekeeping.
RRP: £185

cK

cK

De Grisogono Sugar
The British press was treated to a preview of De Grisogono’s Sugar watches on Valentine’s Day, which is apt because all of us fell in love with them.

The timepieces include white diamonds, emeralds, orange or blue sapphires and can be both full-pavé or with a mother-of-pearl dial. They may be quartz, but the talent on this watch lies within the gem-setting strategies. The stones around the dial are irregularly sized and the stones that radiate from the appropriate aspect of the dial are articulated.

The design itself is impressed by a sugar dice – therefore the name. They usually actually are slightly bit of decadent sweetness.
RRP: POA

De Grisogono

De Grisogono

Guess
Within the eighties, Guess’s advertising campaigns featured girls similar to Claudia Schiffer, Eva Herzigová and Laetitia Casta, all sporting intercourse-rumpled hair, bruised lips and impossibly cool denim.

So it comes as no shock that this yr’s watch collection is impressed by what Guess began off doing – denim. The colourways are a denim-complementing blue and rose gold, which, for girls, means polished rose gold case, dial and bracelet. It is a daring statement, however one that now we have come to anticipate from this model.
RRP: £169

Guess

Guess

Ice-Watch
Super-Slim Ice
Since its launch in 2007, Ice-Watch has cornered the market in modern, fun, frivolous watches. Its angle to colour, which might principally be summed up as, “In the event you can think about it, we've got it” has meant that it has constantly grabbed attention and column inches.

This 12 months’s Basel providing, the Tremendous-Slim Ice, isn't any less colourful, however it does have loads less width. It's created from a single piece of rubber from the strap to the case with the hands and the indices in a contrasting colour.

There are so many options to select from, but we’re reasonably enamoured with this yellow and blue model. Yellow was all around the catwalks this season, nevertheless it’s a difficult colour to put on, so this is the proper approach to work the shade without wanting like a large banana.
RRP: £70

Ice Watch

Ice Watch

Folli Follie Heart4Heart
Folli Follie’s Heart4Heart collection is getting a brand new addition within the shape of this watch. The iconic four-coronary heart configuration in rose-gold plate remains to be there, however this time it's on a ceramic bracelet.
RRP: £330

Folli Follie

Folli Follie

Gucci Guccissima
Though there was a point in Gucci’s historical past when it was synonymous with the overtly sexual, there has always been a streak of stylish sophistication there. This Guccissima is the right instance of that sophistication. It comes in two sizes – 27mm and 36mm – and the enduring Gucci G frames the elliptical case. It's a particularly female timepiece that’s not for those who like to opt for outsized.
RRP: TBC

Gucci

Gucci

Storm Mini Exel
Tourneau shapes have been huge among the excessive-end manufacturers this 12 months, and Storm is among the trend manufacturers adopting the development. This delicate timepiece manages to look each subtle and up to the minute, whereas the date at the 7 o’clock provides just a little quirk to the design.
RRP: £119.99s

Storm

Storm

Startups and upstarts: BaselWorld 2013

Increasingly knowledgeable prospects are straying from the mainstream to seek out something really particular person, which is sweet news for niche watchmakers, says Alex Doak. Our useful guide will provide help to find the choose of the misfits on BaselWorld’s reshuffled floorplan

Arnold & Son Time Pyramid
The biggest watch news of 2012 that you just most likely never heard about was Citizen’s whole acquisition of Prothor Holdings – a Swiss group that features excessive-end motion maker La Joux-Perret, decrease-profile component maker Prototec SA and the Arnold & Son model, which has been separate from British Masters stablemate Graham since 2010.

While many carped on about Citizen’s newfound potential to make affordable Swiss ébauches with proprietary Japanese steadiness springs (a genuine different to ETA), purists have been happy that perennial wallflower Arnold was safe from harm. And the flourish of creativity that adopted has affirmed this renewed confidence.

This 12 months’s Time Pyramid, with its skeletonised, pyramid-shaped movement seemingly floating between two sapphire crystals, is impressed by the regulators created by John and Roger Arnold more than 200 years in the past.
RRP: £34,500

Nomos Glashütte
Orion 38 Grau
Can Nomos Glashütte ever put a foot mistaken? While everyone’s favourite quiet man of watchmaking might be accused of sticking too rigidly to its refined breed of Bauhaus, the method is so perfect and the brand’s irreverent Germanic character so refreshingly un-Swiss that we are going to all the time forgive its lack of experimentation.

Especially when you hear a sales pitch as immediately likeable as that of 2013’s Orion 38 Grau, which could nicely be ‘the’ watch to wear with a suit: “Gray like the skies over Glashütte, or grey like financial bookkeeping?” says the release. “Colourless, sad, unprepossessing? Nonsense! As Bauhaus artist Johannes Itten once stated, gray is ‘easily excitable into magnificent tones’.” We agree.
RRP: £1,530

Nomos Glashutte

Nomos Glashutte

Harry Winston
Histoire de Tourbillon
Our obsession with the tourbillon may have abated with the latest return to easy, retro styling, however the very top end of the market remains to be looking to spend huge bucks on ornately engineered funding pieces.

At watchmaker Harry Winston, part of the Swatch Group, the ongoing collaboration with Greubel Forsey’s mercenary arm Complitime has given us Histoire de Tourbillon, a collection of thoughts-boggling exercises in mechanical gymnastics.
RRP: POA

Harry Winston

Harry Winston

MeisterSinger Singular
Cult model MeisterSinger’s USP is sort of irritatingly easy: a single hour hand, with some extent that’s positive enough to learn off the minutes between the hour indices. The clever use of the musical fermata or ‘pause’ image as its emblem displays MeisterSinger’s guiding philosophy of a extra relaxed perception of time.

Which isn’t to say things don’t get racy, as borne out by the new Singular chronograph in anthracite (following Nomos’s gray development, we be aware) and sporty red accents.

Later this yr, we’ll be seeing MeisterSinger’s Paleograph fitted with its very first in-home motion, plus a really special collaboration with Westminster Abbey to mark the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee.
RRP: £2,850

Meistersinger

Meistersinger

Hublot
Big Bang Ferrari Crimson Magic Carbon
For all of Hublot CEO Jean-Claude Biver’s shameless (but arguably justified) self-promotion and his watch brand’s innumerable advertising ploys and publicity stunts, you can not deny that Hublot makes very first rate watches indeed. The sources and talent inherited from BNB Concept’s dissolution in 2009 seeded its rapid rise to producer status, and now it even makes its personal circumstances as well as actions.

One year on from the primary Ferrari watches, encased in a scratchproof 18ct gold-ceramic compound – or “magic gold”, as Biver so charmingly dubbed it – the new Large Bang Ferrari Red Magic Carbon boasts a carbon-fibre case that’s also solely conceived and manufactured in-home. A brand new “multi-layer principle” includes stacking up to 12 sheets of carbon fibre and forging them in polymerisation ovens.

The result? No bubbles, and subsequently excellent homogeneity as well as vast mechanical power.
RRP: £22,100

Hublot

Hublot

MB&F Megawind
Lots of the most remarkable issues at BaselWorld are to be discovered not on a multi-storey, multimillion-euro stand in Hall 1, however crammed into a makeshift marquee next to the automobile park – called, rather ambitiously, The Palace. Here, the biggest brand is arguably Max Büsser’s science-fiction collective, MB&F, whose new launch is the Megawind.

More than just a variation of HM3, MB&F’s best-selling line, it's actually a totally new technology of HM3, which reworks its bug-eyed time show and encompasses a giant version of Max’s Manga-impressed battleaxe rotor.

Finnish watchmaker Stepan Sarpaneva, co-creator of MB&F’s MoonMachine, offered both the initial thought for the big rotor and the identify Megawind, while Agenhor’s Jean-Marc Wiederrecht was entrusted with turning the drawings of designer Eric Giroud into horological actuality.
RRP: E79,000 plus tax

Luminox Atacama Field
The gasoline tubes on Luminox dials glow 100 times brighter than most Superluminova-equipped timepieces, which means a tough Swiss-made Luminox watch is the final word evening imaginative and prescient package for athletes, outdoorsmen and army men. Indeed, it is the watch of choice for a number of elite forces, including the US Navy SEALs and F-117 Nighthawk Stealth jet pilots, for whom the brand new black-on-black PVD-coated Atacama could have been designed. Named after the notoriously dry Chilean Atacama area, the Atacama Subject series options 45mm cases and durable 26mm leather-based straps.
RRP: £460

Luminox

Luminox

G-Shock
Premium GA 1000FC
More than 200 handmade prototypes have been examined to destruction by Casio till finally, three many years ago, the first “unbreakable” G-Shock watches hit the streets of Japan and began to establish the sub-brand as a true cult.
The latest within the Premium collection is the GA 1000FC, which encompasses the seven G-Shock components – toughness, and resistance to electric shock, gravity, low temperature, vibration, water and shock.
It has been developed with RAF pilots to include essentially the most useful function for the cockpit: a bearing memory compass. Aviators set their target course and, if the watch goes off observe, the LCD display notifies the user.
RRP: £300

G Shock

G Shock

Victorinox Original
It is nonetheless shocking that Victorinox took nearly a century to deviate from cutlery and military-challenge multi-instruments and try its hand at Switzerland’s more conventional trade, however since 1989, the family-run firm has wasted no time in becoming a world-leading watchmaker. The Unique was the very first mannequin, launched in the US in 1989, after which sales increased 20% 12 months on year and Victorinox turned America’s greatest-promoting Swiss watch brand.

Still military-inspired, monochrome in tone and effortlessly straightforward to read, Authentic is being modernised and “urbanised” in 2013 with a new modular leather strap and cuff, its tan colour scheme harking back to the unique Swiss Army officer’s knife of 1891.
RRP: £395

Victorinox

Victorinox

Gc B1 Telemeter
Since Paul Marciano, founding father of the Guess attire brand, started luxurious watch offshoot Gc in 1997, the watch brand has earned the lofty ‘Swiss-made’ appellation and develop into a rock-stable entry-level model for budding watch collectors.

The Telemeter, a brand new execution of Gc’s B1 series in rose-gold PVD coating, achieves a distinguished, classic model with a restraint and composure of which many Swiss grande dames would be proud. The interlocking subdials, Cuban colour scheme and engraved telemeter calibrations all lend a definite ‘gentleman explorer’ feel. The fashion is rounded off by a croco-embossed leather-based strap, which would co-ordinate properly with the straps on Phileas Fogg’s trunk.
RRP: £465

Gc

Gc

Perrelet Turbine
For the first time since its launch in 2009, Perrelet’s signature Turbine assortment – a spread that makes a kaleidoscopic function of Abraham-Louis Perrelet’s self-winding rotor invention, a key function of the brand that was invented in 1770 – incorporates a chronograph operate with spectacular coherence.

The chronograph measurements are offered by a central seconds chronograph hand and an progressive 60-minute counter, whose two juxtaposed sapphire crystal parts do not detract from the radial dial pattern. It is available in five variants and our favourite must be this slick, titanium-on-titanium quantity with DLC case coating.
RRP: £TBC

Perrelet

Perrelet