If after several years of lectures, studio work and design reviews, one does not emerge with some design (of anything) like the HLQ, a career change is in order. I mean, seriously, how in the world can Hautlence not been the guiding inspiration of any soon-to-be design school grad.
Appreciate the circular “madness” of this piece. Unique, circular apertures for hours, minutes, seconds and date functions. OUCH! On top of that, the open-worked face and honeycomb pattern on the dial put this watch in my Hall of Fame promptly. Check out these features…
• jumping hours: the hour disc remains motionless for 60 minutes; once every hour, the visible mechanism drives the jumper star-wheels, so causing the hour-disc to advance and reveal the next hour.
• retrograde minutes: the retrograde minutes are indicted by the force of the connecting rod and its rack acting on the pinion to which the hand is attached. The latter points to the minutes by turning through a 180 degree arc. At the end of the cycle, i.e. after 60 minutes, the hand reverts to zero, and begins its course again for the next hour.
• dragging seconds: the seconds are indicated by the disc’s dragging rotation on the plate.
• date: the date is indicated on a date disc. The manual date corrector is located on the case at 12 o’clock.
A true limi, there are only 88 numbered editions of this beast. 88 extremely fortunate individuals out there, fortunate enough to claim one of these wristers.
specs for the HLQ…
• jumping date, jumping hour, retrograde minute and running second
• manual winding mechanical movement.
• 40 hour power reserve
• 44mm diameter
• identification and numbering plate on the back
• water resistance to 30 meters
• sapphire crystal with angled edges, multi layer anti reflect
• screwed sapphire case back with stamps and the official engraving
Comments
It depends what you refer to by “design”: I’ve been working in the product design field for 10 years, and I know that this Hautlence is precisely what I don’t want.
The dial is anything but self-explanatory and the movement is a modification of the Peseux 7001, a reliable but low-cost calibre.
If you want to talk about good implementations of design principles, I would like to suggest Ludwig Oechslin’s MIH watch or any model by H. Moser & Cie. These watches are packed with features although their display remains unclettered and can intuitively be read.