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Quality Time
continued
 What Makes A Fine Watch Expensive?
If you've ever wondered what makes a fine watch so expensive, a look at the picture
on the next page explains a lot. All of these pieces have to be precisely manufactured
and then largely assembled by hand. Some Patek Philippes, for example, can have
four to five hundred pieces and take months to assemble. Even without precious
gems encrusting them, they would be expensive.
Even a basic quartz watch that just tells time has 50 to 100 parts. Of course
these are all manufactured and assembled by machine so they are not nearly as
expensive as a fine watch which is assembled and partly made by hand.
As an example, the case for the Rolex Oyster is made from a single block of gold
or platinum or steel. It takes over a hundred operations to turn that block into
a perfectly finished case. The waterproof crown requires 35 more operations.
This, of course, is in addition to the steps to create and assemble the movement.
While the "hand made" Swiss watch by the little old watchmaker bending
over his bench is (and always has been) something of a myth, (computer aided
drafting and manufacturing are now used in many steps) there is still a lot of
hand work to be done in creating and finishing a fine watch. As the people at
Vacheron Constantin so eloquently and poetically put it:
Although today's master watchmakers rely on highly advanced design and manufacturing
equipment, the human hand continues as before to work its incomparable magic.
It alone possesses the innate virtuosity needed to finish to perfection each
and every one of Vacheron Constantin's miniature masterpieces of mechanical wizardry
and aesthetic refinement. Here as always, between even a fine product and a true
work of art lies the many skills of the world's most versatile and sensitive
instrument.
And this is before "complications." Many fine watches tell much more
than the time and date. A watch which tells the phase of the moon or has a minute
repeater (a form of stopwatch) for example is called a "complication." A "grand
complication" may have a tourbillon (which compensates for the earth's gravitation),
a perpetual calendar good for a century, etc. Each complication adds to the technological
complexity—and the price.
When you add up everything it takes to make a fine watch, you can understand
why they are expensive. (This should also tell you that the $150 "Rolex" someone "in
the business" is offering you at wholesale or that you see at the swap meet
is a knock off.)
 Resources
For many people, the usual place to start looking for jewelry is Tiffany & Co.,
the oldest and largest premium jeweler in America. (The life size statute of
Atlas holding up a clock on the facade of their flagship 5th Ave store is a good
indication that Tiffany & Co. has always been involved with time.)
The Tiffany Mark is an excellent place to start. A watch made in classic American
style, it ranges in price from $1,150 to $50,000. Like most jewelers with a watch
line, Tiffany does not make its own movements but gets them from fine Swiss watch
makers. As an example, in the year 2001 Tiffany produced their T-150 with movement
by what many consider the top watch maker in the world—Patek Philippe.
This was not a recent marriage of convenience. As the name implies, the relationship
goes back 150 years to 1851 when the founders of both companies (Charles Lewis
Tiffany and Messers. Patek and Philippe) worked to produce watches for Tiffany & Co.
For those who want greater selection, it is not only hard to beat Traditional
Jewelers in Newport Beach, it's impossible. They have one of the most extensive
collections of fine watches in the country if not the world. They have what many
regard as the top three lines of watches in the world—Patek Philippe, Rolex
and Cartier—along with almost any other top watch maker you can think of:
Girard-Perregaux, Corum, Piaget, Vacheron Constantin, Chopard, Jaeger-Le Coultre,
Breitling, and David Yurman among others. Traditional is one of only five retailers
in the United States which is authorized to sell Cartier's Privée collection.
One unique watch line they now carry is A. Lange & Sohne. This old German
firm has been centered near Dresden for centuries. This, of course, was in East
Germany. With the fall of the Berlin Wall they have been able to sluff off the
communist tradition of shoddy work and return to producing excellent watches
.
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