Caliber de Cartier watch

The 42mm case of the Cartier Caliber de Cartier watch is made of stainless steel and 18K rose gold, and is equipped with the Cartier 1904-PS MC self-winding movement. The silver-white dial is slightly pearlescent, and the unique combination of Roman numeral hour markers and geometric luminous hour markers is a personalized choice among gold watches.

The twin brothers of steel watches

In the watch industry, when it comes to "popular", it is always inevitable to put quotation marks on it. For example, tourbillons have become popular in recent years. Watch manufacturers don’t know what to do so they make tourbillons; watch editors can’t think of a topic to choose from, so they write about tourbillons; customers buy tourbillons when they don’t like other watches—but since then In terms of output, tourbillon watches actually account for only a small share of the entire watch market. Although they are popular, the product itself is by no means popular.

Any product that can be popular is either a new thing that quickly dies after its infinite popularity, or it is a timeless classic. Although I am not an expert in the history of watches, I can tell that gold watches do not fall into the former category. According to my personal experience at auctions, the earliest gold watches can be traced back to the 1940s, a time when men's watches were gradually taking shape and the contemporary features of watches began to emerge. At that time, there were a large number of manufacturers making gold watches, among which the most influential and the most impressive ones were Rolex's Ref. 2940 small three-hand watch and Ref. 3372 large three-hand watch. They use Rolex's iconic "Oyster"-Oyster case and "Bubble Back" case back, coupled with the gold design that was later named "Rolesor" by the manufacturer, it can be said that It’s hard not to become a classic. It is likely that it is precisely because of Rolex’s efforts that gold watches have endured for a long time.

According to modern people's thinking habits, it is easy for us to preconceptionally regard gold watches as the product of a combination of steel watches and gold watches, thinking that it will appear very late. But in fact, gold watches and steel watches appear on the front and back. They are both juniors of gold watches. Even if they are related by blood, they are only cousins, not father and son. Stainless steel appeared on the historical stage at the beginning of the last century. It was not until 1916 that a patent was obtained and mass production began. It would have to wait a few more years before it could be used to make watches. Some people say that stainless steel is the greatest invention of the 20th century. It allows Europeans to eat with their hands even if they cannot afford silver tableware. Its significance is far greater than today's touch-screen mobile phones, Android systems, and somatosensory games.

cocktail theory

Since the 1930s, stainless steel has entered the field of watchmaking, to be precise, into the field of watch manufacturing, while pocket watches have been permanently sealed in the memory of K gold. The transformation of watches by stainless steel is just like today's high-tech ceramics. It is slow and firm, and there is a process of gradual adaptation. Compared with K gold material with thousands of years of application history, stainless steel is a completely new thing. It was born out of the rapidly developing industrialized society. It lacks the elegance and luxury of the aristocracy and replaces it with the simplicity, high yield and low price of industrial products. However, People who were also involved in the process of industrialization did not neglect it because of this. Instead, they highly appreciated this novel and unique material. The huge advantages in price and output eventually completely changed people's aesthetics. Stainless steel also replaced K gold and became the preferred material for making watches.

In addition to pure stainless steel watches, there is also a style that uses stainless steel and K gold materials and has also won praises. At that time, there was no so-called "Assemblage" concept in the clothing industry, and there was not even a hint of it. Therefore, it cannot be said that watches were influenced by the clothing industry. However, the popularity of Jianjin watches is not without trace. A drink that is rapidly gaining popularity in social situations is regarded as having some intrinsic connection with the popularity of Jianjin watches. This drink is "cocktail".

Literally, cock tail means "rooster tail". When people shortened the tail of a mongrel horse to make it look like a cock's tail, cocktail also took on the meaning of a non-purebred horse. The word "cocktail" This is how the mixed drink got its name. Before the 1920s, the word cocktail represented the inferiorization of "pure substances mixed with impurities", which was by no means a compliment; but after the 1920s, the situation changed dramatically, and people began to appreciate processed It is considered that artificial products that add other substances to natural products are more fashionable. This concept led to the popularity of artificial pearls, cosmetics and cocktails, and the awareness of gold watches has also increased rapidly since then.

The temptation of real money

As mentioned before, intergold watches appeared more than half a century ago, and today they are still one of the most popular varieties on the market. Although various high-tech materials have been emerging in recent years, the styles of jianjin have not decreased but have increased, especially in the Chinese market, which has become more and more active.

Generally speaking, those who choose to use intermetallic gold are popular classic models under well-known brands. In other words, after a series has launched a stainless steel model, it still has potential to be tapped, so it will create an intermetallic gold model to make up for the lack of stainless steel models and The price difference of the K gold series leaves a gap in the market. The company that operates this seemingly low-tech method most skillfully, as I can guess even readers, is still Rolex. The same style, the same movement, no need to add any complicated functions, as long as the precious metal material is added, the grade of the product will naturally be upgraded to a higher level, but the price is much cheaper than a gold watch.

I noticed that there are no corresponding words in English or French for "Jianjin watch" or "Jianjin model". In other words, this expression method that is different from "Gold and Steel Watch" is unique to the Chinese. There are also "Gold and Silver Run" with gold and stainless steel, and "Steel King" with a platinum outer ring on the watch case. These have Chinese cultural characteristics. The names are all in line with the principle of being honest and elegant. Among gold, the emphasis is still on gold, not steel. Even if only a small amount is used, the aesthetics and connotation of gold watches are more inclined to gold watches, and their value is by no means comparable to ordinary steel watches. This is probably the main reason why it is popular in the Chinese world.

The common gold watches currently on the market are still the same brands: Omega, Rolex, Cartier, Longines, Tudor, plus new models launched by Tag Heuer and Raymond Weil. These works are all self-winding models with more complex functions than annual calendars and are suitable for matching with less casual clothing. If you are still hesitating about what kind of daily watch to choose, you might as well take a look and see if there are any styles that you like.