Watch 101: What Makes A Watch A Luxury Watch?
Traditional watchmaking values defined luxury watches – but today, the definition is evolving rapidly.
The question of what makes a watch a luxury watch is an interesting one for several reasons, not the least of which is that for much of the history of watchmaking, pretty much any watch could have been defined as a luxury watch. Today, however, accurate watches can be found for as little as twenty dollars on Amazon and for that price you can get a Casio F91W, with a seven year battery and accuracy of ±15 seconds per month. A person interested in watches may therefore reasonably wonder why a time-only mechanical watch from a renowned independent watchmaker may command a six figure price – or more – in the hectic and heated modern watch market. Let’s look at what exactly a luxury watch is, and what makes a luxury watch fit the definition.
Luxury Watches In History: The Rule, Not The Exception
For most of its history, watchmaking was inherently a luxury undertaking, which did not begin to change until the mid-to-late 19th century. Prior to that period, watches were largely handmade, which is not to say that they were made by a single craftsman – the idea that traditional watchmaking is a single watchmaker making everything from the mainspring to the hands to the case, is a pleasant fiction, but a fiction nonetheless. Watches were for most of their history, produced by assembling parts made by dozens of different craftsman – there were specialists who just made mainsprings; others who only made mainspring barrels; others who were exclusively casemakers; and still others who made escapement parts. This division of labor was especially characteristic of the Swiss watch industry – so much so that the longest sentence in Karl Marx’s Kapital is actually a list of all the different component makers active in the Swiss Jura area.
While watches were not, typically, made by a single watchmaker, they were nonetheless assembled from components which were all handmade, and it required considerable skill and time to not only make those components, but to assemble them so that they made up a working watch. This meant that watch production was inherently slow, labor intensive, and that there was a very long period necessary to become expert at the production of specialist components, to say nothing of assembling the entire watch and putting it in running order. Mainsprings, for instance, required sophisticated knowledge of empirical rules for practical metallurgy and this was the case for all other components as well. Interchangeable parts did not exist and if a watch needed repair and a new part was needed, it had to be made from scratch and could not be ordered from a parts catalog as parts catalogs didn’t exist either.
All this made watches expensive and time consuming to produce, and the fact that they were luxury items – available only to the very well-off, which could mean successful entrepreneurs, but also those with either institutional or generational wealth at their disposal – was a natural result of an expenditure of time, by expert craftsmen who had worked for many years to become experts.
This is the basic definition of luxury: it takes as long as it takes, and it costs what it costs; luxury derived originally from rarity of materials or rarity of skills, or difficulty in manufacturing; most often, all three.
The rise of industrial watchmaking, which followed naturally from the Industrial Revolution and the development of production line manufacturing, in which it became possible to produce interchangeable parts, was responsible for the division of watchmaking into a bona fide luxury segment, and another category which consisted of mass produced watches made for a wider and less affluent audience.
Luxury watches at the beginning of the 20th century, were still made with considerable hand work, including hand-finishing, and were generally adjusted to better precision standards. The advent of stainless steel in watchmaking produced a natural distinction between steel-cased, mass produced watches, and finely hand finished watches with cases made of precious metals. By the 1970s, the idea of treating stainless steel as a luxury material had arrived, with the Royal Oak, Nautilus, and eventually other stainless steel luxury sports watches.
The Quartz Crisis forced the mechanical watch industry to change its collective value proposition and turned mechanical watches back into discretionary purchases, rather than essential aids to punctuality in daily life. Today, an argument could be made that irrespective of price point, any mechanical watch is a luxury as even the least expensive can cost in the hundreds of dollars, although the criteria for true luxury are still essentially the same as they were in the 1920s. The caveat to this can be summed up in one word: innovation. The pace of innovation in modern watchmaking far exceeds what was found in traditional watchmaking for much of the 20th century, although classical fine watchmaking values remain in many respects the foundation of the luxury watch category. Let’s first look at those classical values, and then at how innovation is redefining, and continues to redefine, what is and is not a luxury watch.
Movement Finishing
The single most obvious and important feature which sets a luxury watch apart from a utility watch (and this is separate from the idea of price and scarcity, both of which we’ll come to in a minute) is movement finishing. Movement finishing is often thought of as purely cosmetic, but it originally arose as a natural extension of good workshop practices and a craftsman’s natural pride in their work. Finishing produces surfaces which are less susceptible to corrosion; working surfaces which have less friction and therefore function more efficiently; and it also, and at one time most importantly, was necessary in order to remove the burrs and machining marks left by at first, hand tools, and later by machine tools.
Fine hand finishing is still practiced today but has become very rare outside of the high end product catalogs of larger luxury brands, and the comprehensive use of classic hand finishing techniques is increasingly found, if not yet exclusively found, in the work of very small production independent watchmakers.
Precision Adjustment
A hand-finished high end watch would also have been expected by its owner, to keep better time than a cheaper one and since for most of the history of watchmaking, the necessary procedures to make a watch precise were not automated, achieving high precision required sometimes weeks or even months of close fine adjustments to highly sensitive components, by expert technicians who were the most highly prized employees of their respective companies.
A reflection of this can be found in watch advertising from, especially, the beginning of the 20th century, through the post World War II period; watches were often advertised for their history of precision timekeeping and advertisements might proudly list the prizes earned and records set by prestige watches which had been entered in precision competitions, observatory and otherwise. Even the first generation of electrically powered and electronic watches, like the first quartz and tuning fork watches such as the Accutron, were marketed on their benefits as better timekeepers.
Better precision naturally required higher precision manufacturing methods, as well as better quality materials, which could produce their own expenses – selecting the best performing balance springs from a given batch, for instance, or using better quality, harder steels, would naturally lead to greater manufacturing costs.
Low Production And Exclusivity
The combination of hand-finishing – again, as a natural extension of good workshop practices – and the additional expense of pursuing precision in performance – meant that watches which featured both, would naturally be produced in much smaller numbers, not just greater cost.
The famous “dollar watches” produced at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century, could be made by the millions; a precision pocket or wrist chronometer was an inherently much rarer object, more expensive to acquire and harder to find. An interesting partial exception to this general rule was American watch manufacturing – the Elgin National Watch Company at its peak, was able to produce thousands of watches per day and moreover, to an exceptionally high standard of precision (for the time), thanks to highly sophisticated automated milling machines, some of which could perform over a hundred sequential operations. In general, however, high precision in performance and high quality in finishing, meant that luxury watches with those features would be available only at a high cost, and to relatively few individuals.
Miniaturization
It is hard to over-emphasize just how much various watch manufacturers vied to create smaller and smaller movements, as well as unusually thin ones. Miniaturization in precision mechanism without loss of performance – or at least, without a loss of performance so noticeable as to be unacceptable – was a matter of prestige; I was able several years ago to examine an Audemars Piguet catalog of complicated watches many decades old, in which prices actually went up considerably, the smaller the movement.
Extra flat and ultra thin watches were considered especially desirable, and the extent to which, using only simple machine tools and manual techniques, manufacturers were able to produce extremely thin watches as early as the beginning of the 20th century, is often misunderstood by modern collectors. The so-called “knife” pocket watches produced by brands like Vacheron Constantin and Jaeger-LeCoultre, as well as the ultra thin wristwatch movements like the 9P and 12P from Piaget, are incredibly slim; for many decades, the record holder was a pocket watch produced by Vacheron in 1931 which had a movement just 0.90mm thick.
Complexity And Complications
Finally, luxury watch companies also asserted their right to be seen as makers of true luxury watches, in the production of complicated watches, as well as watches incorporating multiple complications. The three classic high complications are the perpetual calendar; the rattrapante, or split seconds, chronograph; and the minute repeater, as well as the even more complex grande et petite sonnerie. These complications are historically, extremely difficult to make and to adjust so that they work reliably, and producing them required not only very precise manufacturing, but also a keen grasp on the part of the technicians, watchmakers, and adjusters of the behavior of very small parts in highly miniaturized mechanisms.
As a result, there is scarcely a better standard for separating the men from the boys when it comes to complicated watchmaking, than the ability to produce all three complications; you may if you want, add to this the tourbillon although the tourbillon has become, unfortunately, something that it is possible to mass produce, at scale; it was at one time a highly demanding regulating device to make and was found only in watches in which the maker was trying to eke out the last and best possible thin margin of advantage over the opposition in terms of precision.
It’s worth remembering also that a complication historically was considered to be anything that displayed additional information; the tourbillon therefore, if you want to be fussy about it, is not a complication per se, but instead, a regulating device.
The Definition Of Luxury Watchmaking
These, then, are what in fine watchmaking, have historically been considered the attributes of a luxury watch; there are of course other possible inclusion criteria but I think these are the broadest and most relevant. To recap:
- Fine movement finishing, of both working and static parts
- Precision adjustment
- Low production and exclusivity (which is really a secondary result of fine movement finishing and precision adjustment)
- Miniaturization
- Complexity, and the ability to produce complications
By these criteria, a true luxury watch might have one, some, or all of these attributes; a finely hand finished, extra thin minute repeater from Vacheron Constantin (to pick just one example) would fit the criteria very nicely.
The Evolution Of Luxury Watchmaking Today
The five basic characteristics of luxury watchmaking listed above, can still be used today and there are examples of watch brands which excel in each category or, as is often the case, more than one. Precision adjustment and performance has become a point of distinction for many brands, including Omega and Tudor, both of which make chronometer certified watches and which also test their watches to Master Chronometer (METAS) standards. Bulgari has established itself as not only an iconic jewelry brand, but also a serious innovator in fine watchmaking, through its years-long setting and breaking of records in ultra thin watchmaking. And for at least the last 25 years, innovations in materials have added value to luxury watchmaking far beyond the traditional division of watches into sports and casual watches in steel, and luxury watches in gold and platinum.
Innovation In Chronometry
One major characteristic of modern luxury watchmaking is innovation in chronometry and precision timekeeping. This can take on a wide range of forms. Luxury brands like Tudor and Omega which do not fit the most traditional definitions of luxury watchmaking, have become luxury category in innovation, if not necessarily in price. Tudor and Omega’s use of METAS certification is value added in terms of precision testing, and also in terms of offering extremely high levels of resistance to magnetism. Rolex’s introduction of first its Chronergy, and then its Dynapulse escapement, likewise offers innovation and precision. Grand Seiko recently introduced the newest and most precise version yet of its signature Spring Drive technology, in the Spring Drive UFA.
Innovation in chronometry is also a part of the identity of independents like FP Journe and De Bethune. In the former case, Journe has been responsible for re-introducing experimentation with resonance in watchmaking after a hiatus of two hundred years, following Breguet’s work. De Bethune’s patents include the unique triple pare-chute antishock system, balances optimized for moment of inertia and aerodynamic efficiency, and flat balance springs which offer the same benefits as Breguet balance springs, but without the additional height. Greubel Forsey since its inception has made both fine finishing and experiments in improved chronometry key to its identity, with its years-long work with mult-axis tourbillons; at every level in the broader category of luxury watchmaking, innovation in escapements, regulating devices like the tourbillon and the remontoir, and other chronometry optimizing features like the fast-rotating mainspring barrels used by Richard Mille and Greubel Forsey, represent the identification of luxury with innovation in precision.
One of this year’s most impressive examples of innovation in chronometry came from Breguet. This was the company’s new magnetic escapement, introduced in the Expérimentale No. 1. The magnetic escapement is combined with a high frequency tourbillon and is adjusted to just ±1 second maximum deviation in rate per day.
Innovation In Materials
Another one of the many aspects of modern luxury watchmaking which distinguishes it from traditional luxury category watchmaking, is innovation in case materials. One of the watch industry’s biggest leaders in this respect is Hublot, which has introduced an almost bewildering range of novel case materials over the years. “The Art Of Fusion” at Hublot originally referred to unusual combinations of materials – especially the use of gold and rubber in the same watch case – but Hublot has also introduced new gold alloys, new ceramics (including the first colored ceramics in which different colors are used in the bulk of the material) and various types of synthetic sapphire cases.
De Bethune has become famous for its innovative use of titanium, which it heat tempers to various colors; one of the most spectacular examples is the DB28xs Yellow Tones, in which the entire case as well as the dial and movement bridges are in yellow heat-tempered titanium. Innovation in materials can also include some exotic new materials which would have been unimaginable even in relatively recent history; one example is Vantablack, which is a material consisting of vertically oriented carbon nanotubes, and which absorbs virtually all light. The blackest known substance, Vantablack is used as a dial material by Moser.
Innovation In Complications
This is one of the most easily visible, but also one of the most difficult areas of fine watchmaking in which to innovate, as prototyping and R&D is both expensive and time consuming. As a result, innovating in complications is probably the rarest area of innovation in modern watchmaking and to the extent that it exists, it tends to be the purview of companies with a history of technical watchmaking achievement in general, and complicated watchmaking achievement in particular.
A very impressive recent example is the Blancpain Grande Double Sonnerie, which is a platform for a number of inventions; it’s the first grande et petite sonnerie which is capable of playing two different tunes, which can be chosen by the user.
Innovation In Design
Innovation in design is often related to, but is also distinct from, innovation in materials. One notable example from the world of independent horology is MING, in which luminous materials are used not just as enhancements to legibility, but as design elements in their own right, as in the “Special Projects Cave” MING 20.01 Series 3.
Design innovation can also be enabled by technical innovation. Ressence, for instance, offers a visual and tactile experience which is unique to its watches, thanks to its ROCS (Ressence Orbital Convex System) in which the design and mechanics are indistinguishably intertwined.
These are just some of the features which differentiate today’s luxury watchmaking landscape from traditional criteria for luxury watches, although the list is by no means comprehensive.
One obvious criterion for classifying a watch as a luxury watch is of course, price, although this is probably the most elastic of all criteria and generally speaking, luxury pricing in fine watchmaking doesn’t exist in a vacuum. A watch may, thanks to shifts in collective tastes as well as shifts in, and increases in, demand, may cause the price for a specific model or even an entire category of watches to rise dramatically (or fall dramatically, although by and large the last ten to fifteen years have witnessed increasing prices thanks to both increased demand and decreased supply). One obvious and fairly recent example was the enormous spike in prices for stainless steel sports models, and stainless steel sports models with integrated bracelets, during the COVID lockdown period from 2020 to roughly late 2022, when prices began correcting; the watches were of course the same watches but high demand drove prices in both the new to retail, and pre-owned markets, to unprecedented levels. Once again, such price fluctuations occur in the larger context of both the attraction of specific models (a factor which includes the perceived prestige conferred by them) and the overall strength of the brand which has produced them, but the extent to which speculative pricing based on scarcity and liquidity should sway decisions on what to collect, must be left to the discretion of the individual collector.
This, then, is the evolving landscape of luxury watchmaking and the criteria which define what is and is not a luxury watch. While traditional factors like hand finishing, newer factors like innovations in materials, chronometry, materials, and design, and the collective perception of prestige conferred and scarcity measured against demand are all established features in the modern luxury watch landscape, how each will play out as fine watchmaking evolves, remains to be seen.