A. Lange & Söhne Takes Us On A Hands-On Journey Into Watchmaking

Insights from the latest session of the Lange Connoisseur’s Akademie, which A. Lange & Söhne hosted in Phuket.

- Jamie Tan

The Zeitwerk is by far A. Lange & Söhne’s most modern collection. Its concept is simple: time is presented horizontally in a digital format, exactly like how you’d read or write it.

The idea may be straightforward, but executing it with a mechanical movement is anything but. For one, the display format itself is a hurdle to overcome. As three separate number wheels are needed, fitting them under the dial while keeping them close to their respective apertures is no mean feat. Driving these wheels and making them jump instantaneously, whether singly or all three at once, is also difficult given the energy demands placed on the barrel. There’s also the issue of keeping the timepiece’s form factor manageable – it is a wristwatch after all.

A. Lange & Söhne has succeeded despite these technical challenges, with solutions ranging from the Zeitwerk’s signature winged “time bridge” on the dial to the remontoir d’égalité constant force mechanism. Thus, the Zeitwerk family continues to grow, with new models sporting different complications being unveiled every few years.

The latest addition is the Zeitwerk Date introduced earlier this year at SIHH. In this watch, the current date is highlighted using a red marker under the flange, which has been printed a la a “regular” date wheel, except in negative. It’s an elegant addition to a timepiece that already has a large digital display, and certainly fits in with the Zeitwerk family’s atypical interpretation of watch complications.

Steady Evolution