About time: on your marques
Abid Rahman
A noticeable trend in recent years has been watchmakers collaborating with manufacturers of other luxury products. We've had makers of yachts and private jets produce watches - but to be honest the idea sounded lame at conception and they haven't done so well - whereas cars and watches has been a zooming success.
We're not talking about any old cars either, unsurprisingly there's no market for a luxury Chevrolet watch. No, it's mainly European luxury sports cars, invariably British marques, that have led the way and this week we look at three of the most interesting collaborations.
First up we have the long established and successful pairing of Crewe-based Bentley and Swiss watchmaker Breitling from the equally glamorous village of Grenchen. Breitling for Bentley has become the watchmaker's ultra-luxury line and I'm sure you've seen the adverts with a thoroughly English David Beckham stepping out of a thoroughly English Bentley sporting a sort-of-but-not-really-at-all-but-lets-kind-of-convey-the-idea-of-a-half English watch.
At Baselworld this year, Breitling introduced a couple of new Breitling for Bentley watches, chief among them the GMT Light Body B04 (above left). The clues are all in the name: as well as featuring a second time zone, this watch also boasts a Breitling in-house B04 movement and, most intriguingly of all, the extremely lightweight titanium case and rubber strap, meaning you'll hardly notice this meaty monster on your wrist.
Of course, visually the watch takes up a lot of real estate with its 49mm-diameter case. There is a lovely machined bezel (inspired by the Bentley grill, don't you know) and all that dial space means Breitling can fill it with their trademark busy indications including the three sub-dials - quarter of a second chronograph, 30-minute and 12-hour totalisers. Other features include a date window, a Controle Officiel Suisse des Chronometres-certified chronometer, 100 metres of water resistance and an impressive 70 hours of power reserve. The Breitling for Bentley GMT Light Body B04 is priced at HK$111,740.
The other standout feature is the brown leather racing old school strap. Inside is an FC-350 automatic movement with an anaemic 38 hours of power. Limited to 1,888 pieces the Vintage Rally Healey GMT 24H is priced at HK$20,200 and comes in a special box set.
Confusingly, there is a Swiss watchmaker named Jaguar, but it has nothing to do with the car company. In fact, they've had legal wrangles over the name, so there's little chance of a collaboration there.
Indeed, British brand Jaguar (the car company) has leant the prestige of its racing heritage, luxury positioning and global name recognition to watch brand Bremont.
The two brands have created six stunning special watches for the limited run of six new E-Types. The watch itself (top right) is beautifully designed and respectful of the heritage of the E-Type, with the case sized at 43mm and made of lightweight aluminium and dial design based on a heritage rev counter with car chassis numbers. The rotor for the Bremont proprietary movement is a tribute to the Jaguar driving wheel. The watches will be only available to the lucky people getting the six new E-Types but watch out for future collaborations between the two companies.
