SPACE TIME

Get cosmic with dials carved out of meteorites

- JOANNE CLASBEY

BUYING A VINTAGE watch is exciting-not only because of the old-school design but the history it has witnessed. Imagine, then, how inspiring it would be to glance at your wrist and see a fragment from a heavenly body that’s billions of years old and, just as incredibly, has travelled from outer space. That’s what meteorite dials deliver.

Most meteorites were formed early in the history of the solar system—about 4.5 billion years ago. Made up of rock and metal debris, these solid masses that crash to Earth are the result of asteroid collision in the belt between Mars and Jupiter, or are fragments of Mars or the Moon. As one of these objects enters the Earth’s atmosphere it heats up, because of friction, pressure and interaction with atmospheric gases, and radiates energy, becoming a meteor or shooting star. When it hits land, what remains is called a meteorite.

The two meteorites favoured by the watch industry are Gibeon, which landed in Namibia, and Muonionalusta, said to be the oldest known meteorite, which hit Sweden about a million years ago and was discovered in 1906. They are named after the places where they were found. To look at in the field, these fragments of rock aren’t particularly impressive. It’s only when they are split open that their beauty is revealed.