Luxury wristwatches from Cartier

Cartier watches are always focused on the relationship between form and movement, aesthetics and "savoir-faire", technique and art. This continual quest is the driving force behind every new watchmaking challenge for Cartier watches. Cartier continues to harness each new skill and talent to combine tradition and innovation. In the mysterious and subtle world of cartier watchmaking, artist and technician work side by side as willing partners. These are the fundamental concepts underlying all creations in Cartier watches.The history of Cartier is fantastic, as it invented many styles of watches that are still produced today. Louis-Francois Cartier was born in 1819. At the age of 28 in 1847, after an apprenticeship with master watchmaker Adolphe Picard, Louis-Francouis Cartier took over his master's Paris jewellery business. He built his reputation by knowing how to satisfy the most extravagant of desires. The first wrist watch made by Cartier was called the Santos Dumont named after the Brazilian Aviator in 1904. 2 years later, Cartier began experimenting with jewel – encrusted watches.
In 1911 Louis Cartier created the TORTUE and the BAIGNOIRE. 1917 saw the introduction of the famous Cartier Tank watch.
In the early 1920s Cartier formed a joint company with Edward Jaeger (of the famed Jaeger-Le Coultre company) to produce movements solely for Cartier. Thus was the famed European watch & clock company born, although Cartier continued to use movements from other great makers.
The most remarkable moments of Cartier were the creation of the first man's wristwatch, the first water resistant timepiece. Cartier watches can be found having movements from world's most famous watch manufacturers such as: Jaeger-Le Coulter, Vacheron Constantin, Audemars Piguet and Movado.
Today Cartier continues designing beautiful works of art for men and women. In its watch arsenal one can find such famous collections. Cartier watches are available in a wide range of prices and styles. If you are looking for a prestigious name brand that offers a mix of quality craftsmanship and contemporary styling, one need look further than Cartier.

Cartier NOW Available at WorldofWatches.com!

Wrist watch - how it was

The wrist watch is a small sized portable timepiece that is able to display time and in some cases, the day, date as well as month and year. The wrist watch is in fact a comparatively new invention. Originally the first portable time pieces were designed to be kept in the pocket, hence the name “pocket watches” . The first wrist watch was the invention of a person named Patek Philippe who invented it around the end of the nineteenth century and it was then thought of as being a women’s accessory.

It was not until the beginning of the twentieth centaury that the first mens wrist watches began to appear. This was when Alberto Santos Dumont asked his friend Louis Cartier for a watch that could be easily used and the latter responded by giving him a leather-band wrist watch that the gents wrist watch first made an appearance in the beginning of the twentieth century. The benefit of wearing a watch on the wrist was first noticed by men who wore it in this way during World War I who did not need to fumble in their pockets to check what time it was and could merely glance at their wrist watch to ascertain the time. As a consequence, even today most Westerners wear their watches on the wrist, a direct consequence of World War I.

Nowadays wristwatches are available either purely as a time piece and good quality wristwatches are available for less than $100 or you can pay many thousands for a top quality Rolex or Cartier watch which are as much an item of jewellery as a timepiece.

Not only men's wearing watches

For A.Dunhill Ltd, car-themed watches are part of their long association with the automobile, dating back to the days when the first horseless carriages appeared.

ALFRED Dunhill Timepieces go back a long way, around the time when motorcars first hit the road at the beginning of the 20th century.

In 1903, cars afforded little or no protection from the weather and, with all the manual adjustments, hand throttles, crashing gearboxes, fuel and ignition settings that had to be manually tweaked while driving, well, how could the well-dressed gentlemen have time to check his pocket watch to find out what the time was?

The answer was obvious to Alfred Dunhill. If we could have a clock in the house, why not have one in the car? So, he came up with a pocket watch that fitted snugly inside a sturdy, dashboard-mounted brass case. The case was teardrop shaped and had a hinged porthole cover which allowed the watch to be removed at the end of the journey.

The Dashboard Clock in brass casing circa 1903 was usually placed upside down to protect it from the mostly unfavourable weather in England.

This was Dunhill’s first foray into watches and it opened up a whole new world for his company.

Soon, he was interpreting the timepieces in unprecedented ways; the belt buckle watch, the lighter watch, the pen watch and the money clip watch. Wristwatches, however, remained his forte.

The tradition continues today, with cars continuing to inspire the dunhill watch collection.

The A-Centric, an understated watch inspired by dunhill’s century-old “Motorities” heritage has the outer chapter ring displaying the days of the month marked by a revolving hand with a crescent tip. The unique Rev-o-Meter Calendar, inspired by the classic rev counter in cars, reminds the wearer when to advance the hand to a new month.

The classic looking A-Centric Pentagraph with its five dials.

For those who like classic looking watches, the A-Centric Pentagraph, with its central 12-hour dial and outer date ring is a combination of old world elegance and a contemporary look.

Its name derives from five separate hands, all driven from the centre of the dial. The hands indicate hours, minutes, seconds, date and an additional time zone.

The outer ring is a 24-hour dual time-zone indicator, the second ring gives the date, the third ring shows the seconds and the main one, a 12-hour dial, represents local time.

The Wheel Watch Chronograph with its unique mono-lug case.

The Wheel Watch Chronograph has a unique mono-lug case shape that harks back to metal spinners often used to secure wheels to period sports cars.

The orginal Wheel Watch, the Petrolhead, with its power reserve and date display features, is now complemented by a chronograph version designed for timing everything from the speed of a McLaren F1 to the perfect boiled egg.

With its 42mm case bordered by an engine turned bezel that cleverly conceals the crown and push pieces to maintain the clean lines of the watch, this watch is something fun and unique.

A 1936 facet watch which was the first wristwatch to appear in a dunhill catalogue, though the earliest dunhill watches dates to 1925.

Other watches in the collection include the rugged “Citytamer”, a sophisticated and elegant watch with a horizontally-split, two-part case with top-loading screws inspired by the bonnet of a period sports car and “Carwatch”, which takes its cue from the Edwardian driver’s watches designed to be worn on the side of the wrist, rather than on top so that they could be seen without the wearer having to release take his hands off the bucking steering wheel.

The A.Dunhill Ltd watch collection is available at the dunhill boutique at Starhill Gallery, Kuala Lumpur.

by http://thestar.com.my