Patek Philippe ‘In-Line’ Perpetual Calendar Ref 5236P-001: Achieving its simple looks required engineering so complex, it prompted three patent applications.
ZURICH, April 13 Geneva’s international expo of fine watches switches to Shanghai on Wednesday for a physical version after staging an online edition to keep the prestigious fair going during the pandemic. The Salon International de la Haute Horlogerie, now restyled as Watches and Wonders,.
If you can bear to, you may recall that towards the end of 2019 there was a glut of stories in the media heralding the return of the Roaring Twenties. Just as the generation of a century ago spent the decade celebrating the end of The Great War with dancing and democracy, so too were we set to revel in a world rid of post-financial-crisis austerity. Oh, the hope!
No one will need reminding of just how wildly inaccurate those technicoloured visions of our future proved to be. But in anticipating the welcome return of haircuts, and all those pints we’ve not poured ourselves, it seems just about fitting to enjoy the centenary of a watch that symbolises the abandoned spirit of the 1920s. Whether it could one day come to mean something similar for this decade is perhaps one for another day.
Some will say this is a headline that’s been coming, many more will step into the story without knowing what to expect. At Watches And Wonders, the watch fair taking place – via the web – in Geneva this week, Cartier has reintroduced its silent icon, the Tank Must.
For contemporary style mavens who have been lauding the 1970s, Warhol-era original Tank Must, particularly in its burgundy-dialled livery, this will be a moment of mixed emotions: satisfaction that their appraisal of the dandyish design as a thinking man’s classic has been recognised with a reissue, but perhaps a little disappointment that their secret is now, finally, out.