WONDERFUL TONIGHT

The WOW Thailand Editor on the timepieces that moved him at Watches and Wonders Geneva 2021

- RUCKDEE CHOTJINDA

Unlike the first digital Watches & Wonders in 2020 edition, at the start of the pandemic, the organisers of Watches & Wonders Geneva knew well beforehand that the fair had to take place digitally again this year. (The 2020 edition was the first major all-digital watch fair ever, and it took place at such a radical moment in history that no one faulted it for anything - Ed). An online platform was developed specifically for journalists from around the world to attend brand announcements, join press group e-meetings and retrieve necessary materials from the media centre. And, totally by coincidence, this year’s event is bigger than ever with 38 participating brands, partly because it has welcomed some former exhibitors from the now-defunct Baselworld (HourUniverse remains unconfirmed for this year). That means there are even more watches to talk about for Watches & Wonders 2021, and below are the ones I am personally impressed with.

For the 90th anniversary of the Reverso, Jaeger-LeCoultre enters a new frontier with a quadriptyque Reverso (pictured overleaf) bearing two dials on the case and two more on the cradle. The watch, known as the Reverso Hybris Mechanica Calibre 185, packs most of the expected high-end complications and more, such as the tourbillon, perpetual calendar, four-digit year indication, minute repeater, moon phase as seen from the northern and the southern hemispheres, and the apogee, perigee and height of the moon. Essentially, this feature can be used to predict phenomena such as the supermoons and the solar and lunar eclipses.