Usually, if you’re looking for digital watches, at least as they’re commonly defined, you’d have been better off attending the Consumer Electronics Show in Vegas last week rather than trekking to Geneva this week for SIHH, the year’s first major trade fair for the highest echelons of the watch industry. But not all “digital” watches are equal. Germany’s A. Lange & Söhne, for example, one of the most elite watch maisons exhibiting at the Salon, has been creating its own decidedly high-end version of a digital watch ? that is, one that tells time via digits rather than hands ? for 10 years now, and its highlight piece of this year’s show is a new model in its groundbreaking Zeitwerk collection with an innovative date display. And yes, it’s all mechanical. A. Lange & Sohne Zeitwerk Date – front
The Zeitwerk Date, with its all-new manufacture movement, represents the latest leap forward for the iconoclastic timepiece, whose design is inspired by the famous clock at Dresden’s Semper Opera House ? Dresden, of course, being the nearest large city to Glashutte, the cradle of German watchmaking and longtime home of A. Lange & Söhne. Introduced in 2009, the Zeitwerk was the first mechanical wristwatch with a constant-force escapement and precisely jumping digits for the hours and minutes; it has since become firmly ensconced within Lange’s well-defined portfolio of watch families, with increasingly ...