Wishlist: Van Cleef & Arpels' Midnight Planétarium Watch
2:33:00 PM
The only watch I've ever wanted
I don't normally wear a watch because I feel like watch is an accessory that tells your character, you can only choose one watch and wear the same watch through out the year but I am the kind of person that get bored easily and I wouldn't want to wear the same watch everyday, probably I also have never found any watch that is special enough to make me wanna wear it everyday until I have discovered this Midnight Planétarium Watch from Van Cleef & Arpels' Poetic Complications™ collection.
For as long as I can remember, I have always been obsessed with the astronomy and the universe. The dark sky, the endless boundary of space, the beauty of the the stars millions of light-year away that we can see on the night sky, the planet shape. Everything about the space is so fascinating and mysterious at the same time. That is probably the reason why I got so excited when I first saw this watch.This watch is the entire universe in your hand, or to be more precise, the entire solar system on your wrist!!
Van Cleef & Arpels collaborated with Christiaan van der Klaauw, a watchmaker who is well known for making planetarium watch and spent three years in total to create this masterpiece.The watch was introduced in 2014, it has six rotating disks, one for each planet. The pink gold sphere represents the sun and the other six spheres made of semiprecious stones surrounding the pink gold sphere represents, in order, Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn just like how it is in our solar system. In addition to the planet, the watch features a 'Lucky Star', allowing you to set a day in a year (your birthday for example) to be your lucky day that the earth will rotate to the lucky star on the exact day of every year. The watch mechanisms moves in the same way the planets in the solar system move so while wearing this watch, you will be able to observe the real time planets orbits. You will see the earth orbits back to the same position after one year, the Mercury in 88 days and the Saturn in 29 years.
The Midnight Planétarium Watch is one of the most complicated watch I've ever seen. Forget the number 1-12, this watch replaces the normal time telling system with a whimsical one. Follow the shooting star and it will tell you the hour and the minutes. The red arrow at the ring of the watch indicates which date and month is it. Taking into account how complicated the mechanism of the watch is, it's almost feel like the watch itself is operating with magic. I wouldn't be surprise if someone think I came from Harry Potter's world when they see me wearing it.
Photo Credit: www.vancleefarpels.com
Photo Credit: www.vancleefarpels.com
Photo Credit: www.vancleefarpels.com
Photo Credit: www.vancleefarpels.com
Description from the website of Van Cleef & Arpels
"Poetic Complications Collection, Midnight Planétarium Watch. 44 mm pink gold case; pink gold bezel; aventurine dial, pink gold sun and shooting star, serpentine Mercury, chloromelanite Venus, turquoise Earth, red jasper Mars, blue agate Jupiter, sugilite Saturn. Pink gold crown with sapphire case back. Matte black alligator strap with pink gold folding clasp. Self-winding mechanical movement (Stern Manufacture), equipped with a Christiaan Van der Klaauw module developed exclusively for Van Cleef &Arpels, 48 hour power reserve. Numbered and unlimited edition.
The Midnight Planétarium watch offers the fascinating possibility of wearing the universe at your wrist. The dial depicts a miniature reproduction of the Sun and the six planets visible to the naked eye: Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn and Earth. Thanks to an exclusive module, each planet moves on its own disc at its genuine speed of rotation"
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TECHNICAL DETAILS
Movement
Self-winding mechanical movement with a Christiaan van der Klaauw Planetarium module developed exclusively for Van Cleef & Arpels.
Functions
A miniature representation of the movement of six planets around the sun and their position at any given time. Earth, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn.
Case
Pink gold case, 44mm diameter.
Dial
Pink gold, aventurine, serpentine, chloromelanite, turquoise, red jasper, blue agate and sugilite.
Strap
Black alligator bracelet.
Buckle
Pink gold folding buckle.
"
TECHNICAL DETAILS
Movement
Self-winding mechanical movement with a Christiaan van der Klaauw Planetarium module developed exclusively for Van Cleef & Arpels.
Functions
A miniature representation of the movement of six planets around the sun and their position at any given time. Earth, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn.
Case
Pink gold case, 44mm diameter.
Dial
Pink gold, aventurine, serpentine, chloromelanite, turquoise, red jasper, blue agate and sugilite.
Strap
Black alligator bracelet.
Buckle
Pink gold folding buckle.
"
2 comments
This watch is very interesting! Love the idea behinds this design :)
ReplyDeleteI agree, I can see that the designers put a lot of thought into it. And 3 years in creation, that's a real hard work :)
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