Had he not died long before his time, Elvis Presley would have celebrated his 80th birthday this year. Since the King wore an avant-garde Hamilton Ventura watch as early as 1961 in the film “Blue Hawaii”, Hamilton decided to pay tribute to Elvis’s 80th birthday (still celebrated every year at Graceland) with a new Ventura model equipped with the brand’s new H-10 movement. Appropriately enough, the new model has an 80-hour power reserve that is propagating through the more affordable collections within the Swatch Group’s portfolio of brands (see Keith Strandberg’s article on the new Hamilton movements for more details on the H-10).
While Hamilton’s connection with the King of Rock and Roll came about through product placement in a film, Raymond Weil has long been cultivating links with the world of music, thanks largely to the owning family’s love of music. For the first time, Raymond Weil incorporated this love of music directly into a tourbillon with the new Nabucco Cello Tourbillon. Its bridges mimic the shape of the cello’s f-holes and four strings cross the watch between 3 and 9 o’clock. The entire skeletonized design is visible from the front and back thanks to sapphire crystal on both sides. The price is an unbeatable sub-40,000 dollars, for a tourbillon which is limited to only 10 pieces and is, unusually for a tourbillon, water resistant to 200 metres.
Our reviews of the Only Watch 2015 pieces started last month, featuring the unique pieces presented for the auction by De Bethune, Jacob & Co. and Vacheron Constantin, to name but a few. Leroy scored a hat trick over the past few weeks, being featured in August with its Only Watch 2015 model and its French origins after headlining the site Olivier Müller’s appraisal of the brand’s exploits in high-precision timekeeping.
