‘Watch Spotting in London’
A Longines w/ Fancy Lugs, A Beautiful Chronomètre Bleu, and A Split-Seconds Patek Philippe Pocket watch
It’s been a few weeks since returning to the U.S. and I thought I would expand upon the encounters with friends throughout the trip via the “Watch Spotting” series. Right as I had arrived back from Switzerland, I took a trip to London for the day. I met back up with Perth (@edinburghtimepieces) who had joined me on the trip to the Musée Atelier Audemars Piguet. Perth came through with the photography earlier that week at AP, and followed up with catching some more great flicks throughout the rest of the day.
We spent the afternoon wandering around for lunch. Unfortunately, the Thai restaurant we showed up to without a reservation didn’t recognize us from watch-Instagram. We tried to inform them of our combined follower count, but no budge. We laughed later upon seeing the line of people outside of McDonald's waiting eager to order. “Waitlisted at McDonald’s’ Perth murmured. Eventually, we made our way to Somlo London in Burlington Arcade where we were kindly given permission to check out a few Patek Philippe & Piaget timepieces. I tend to trek out to their location whenever I am in the city, so it was quite cool to revisit the location after 2 years.
Split Seconds Patek Philippe Pocket watch retailed Black, Starr & Gorham. Location: Somlo London
We then proceeded to link up with Kacper, founder of Time & Read. Kacper brought along a portfolio of fantastic vintage watch advertisements he had been working on for his forthcoming articles on T&R. Although I won’t be giving a sneak peek of his projects, I will emphasize they are going to be super interesting and worth keeping an eye out for!
Vintage Longines Pocket Watch
One timepiece he brought was a vintage Longines pocket watch with a sector dial. The watch featured a pair of cathedral hands, and applied Arabic numerals. The caseback features an interesting engraving, which he touches on within his social media post.
Vintage Movado
Photograph by @edinburghtimepieces
The Movado featured an interesting sector dial also. An attractive element to the timepiece is the stepped case and lugs.
F.P. Journe Chronomètre Bleu
Photograph by @edinburghtimepieces
On Perth’s wrist was his F.P. Journe Chronomètre Bleu. The wise young man had acquired his years before the hype, so I’d imagine he is feeling pretty content with the fact it has climbed in price over recent months. However, he isn’t coddling the timepiece or overly consumed by what he can see from flipping it. He wears and enjoys the timepiece like a true enthusiast. Word on the street is that he recently scored a tantalum deployant buckle at MSRP.
Vintage Ulysse Nardin
Another timepiece from the era Kacper focuses on was the vintage time-only Ulysse Nardin. The black dial has a nice chalkboard-like aesthetic accompanied by luminous Roman numerals. Although the lighting was dim, Perth managed to catch some great lifestyle flicks of the watch.
Vintage Longines
After a few minutes chatting with Kacper about his fututre articles and what he’s been involved with lately, we broke out the star of the show. I really dug this one, and have admired it a number of times on social media. Upon our previous correspondence, we came to find out the 34mm yellow gold case was made by Jung & Cie (a casemaker from La Chaux de Fonds). I swiftly took a few wristshots of his prized 1943 Longines with a “salmon” dial (Perth captured a slightly better shot below).
Photograph by @edinburghtimepieces