WATCHES
BACK TO BASICS
Raw, uncompromised, stripped back – it’s a formula that works for watches too
Driving a skeleton car has very obvious pros and cons, as any Ariel Atom owner will tell you. It saves weight and looks cool. But it’s also noisy and lets in all of the weather. Skeletonising a watch does not come with these disadvantages, but the process of stripping it back to the essentials has long been a great challenge.
The reason for early skeleton clocks was simple. Nowadays if you want to let people know how well business is going, you can buy a Bugatti. Around 200 years ago a good way of making people jealous was a fancy clock. Just owning one set you apart from the masses, but clockmakers, looking for new ways to stand out, hit upon the idea of stripping away the metal casing so you could admire the gears and springs at work.