If reading the interview with Jack Heuer has inspired you to add to your vintage Heuer collection, then the perfect opportunity is coming up in December 2010, when renowned Heuer collector Arno Haslinger will auction 81 watches from his amazing collection through Bonhams.
Arno’s collection is detailed in his terrific book “Heuer Chronographs” which has detailed photos of all the famous Heuer models from the 1970s, as well as the stories behind the development of each model. The book is a great read in itself, but it now also serves as a sort of preview of some of what you will find for sale in December.
So, what about the collection itself? Simply put, this is the best private Heuer collection in the world. Arno is a fastidious collector- he doesn’t touch anything unless it is 100% original and in mint condition- many of his watches are unworn “New Old Stock” examples- proper “NOS” with the fantastic original Heuer red sticker still on the back.
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Jack Heuer is one of the legends of the Swiss watchmaking industry, having led Heuer through it’s most dynamic- and turbulent- era.
The watches today that we think of when people talk about their love of vintage Heuer watches were all created under Jack Heuer’s leadership- Monaco, Autavia, Carrera, Monza, Montreal, Daytona, Silverstone- and many more.
Having cut his ties with the company following its forced sale in the early 1980s, Jack Heuer went on to a successful “second career” in the electronics industry, before returning to TAG Heuer in 2001.
But Jack is not just a link to the past- he has helped shape some of the TAG Heuer’s that we see today.
He is much-loved at TAG Heuer and played a key role at the event to mark TAG Heuer’s 150th anniversary, where he gave the opening address.
As well as finding out more about Jack Heuer’s early days in charge of Heuer, I wanted to show Jack several photos of famous Heuer models to get some of his memories about these watches and his perspective on TAG Heuer today.
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Baselworld is an incredibly busy time for anyone in the watch industry, and this is especially the case for the CEOs who are here to meet customers, talk with the media and generally promote their brand at a time when everyone is completing for attention and space.
When I met with Jean-Christophe Babin he was nine hours into a day that was back-to-back with meetings- yet he still looked and sounded as fresh as he would have at 9am.
The impact that Jean-Christophe Babin has had at TAG Heuer is hard to over-state. At his speech to launch the Pendulum movement, Jack Heuer said he considered Jean-Christophe to be the “fifth generation” of his family to run the company- it’s hard to get a more meaningful seal of approval than this.
I had 30 minutes with Jean-Christophe and was keen to get his perspective on his time at TAG Heuer and what he wanted to achieve in the future. The resulting interview was illuminating and frank- I hope you enjoy it.
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The highlight for me of TAG Heuer’s Baselworld watches was the TAG Heuer 300SLR, a new limited edition heritage watch to be released in October alongside the Monaco 24 and the new Grey Heuer Monaco re-edition.
While I didn’t manage to take any photos of the new watch, Hodinkee did manage to get some shots, which you can see here.
The 300SLR (ref. CAR2112) is based on the new Carrera Calibre 1887, but loses the external bezel and carries no Carrera markings. The dial itself is a metallic bronze colour, reminiscent of the Heuer Carrera 150.173F of the 1970s, and is finished with orange detailing.
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Two more watches that are new for Baselworld 2010 are the TAG Heuer Link Advanced GMT and the Lady F1.
I’ve never been a big fan of the Link series- OK, its more elegant than some of the more overtly sporting TAG Heuer watches, but it’s never been one to set the heart racing.
This GMT version however is quite clever. The watch has a magnetic bezel system, and as you rotate the bezel the disc with the city names also rotates.
The watch uses the Calibre 7 movement (ETA 2893) and features a hidden button at 10 o’clock to re-set the GMT.
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Debating the merits of watch movements is usually a sport reserved for the true Watch Idiot Savant. When I bought my first automatic watch (a Heuer Monza re-edition), I took it back to the store shortly after I bought it because I noticed that if I didn’t wear it for a few days, it tended to stop. The funny thing is that as soon as I started wearing it again, it worked fine…surely I can’t be the only one who has done this.
One of the secrets of the Swiss watch industry over the last 20 years is that basically everyone was using the same movements- OK, a few high-end brands had their own, but generally it was ETA/ Valjoux as far as they eye could see and customers generally didn’t care.
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Baselworld was the first chance that I had to put together the new TAG Heuer Silverstone re-edition and a vintage Heuer Silverstone to compare the similarities. Obviously, the two are very similar, with the only differences being:
- New Silverstone (right) slightly larger diameter than vintage (left), as well as having a thicker case
- The vintage blue Silverstone has a metallic inner bezel, where the new model’s bezel has the same finish as the dial
- The word “Swiss” has moved from the top of the date window to sitting either side of the date window
- The sub-dials of the new Silverstone has more hash marks than the vintage version
And that’s it- apart from that, they are identical..and the differences mentioned above are pretty small in the scheme of things.
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The Monaco 24 Concept that was shown at Baselworld last year is being prepared for an Q4 2010 launch. The watch has a titanium PVD case and the Calibre 36 (El Primero) movement.
A quick re-fresh- The Monaco 24 uses the same case as the Monaco LS, with the curved crystal wrapping around the side of the case. The Monaco 24 has bespoke pushers and crown, and swaps the LS-layout for more traditional sub-dials.
The dial has the famous “Gulf” colours also used on the Limited Edition Gulf Monaco released last year.
The real magic to this watch is firstly the black PVD titanium (reminescent of the famous Heuer Monaco PVD) and secondly the “floating” round dial that sits suspended in the case.
TAG Heuer will release the Monaco 24 in the fourth quarter of 2010 alongside the new Grey Heuer Monaco….and a third “heritage” watch.
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TAG Heuer have shown a Grey re-edition TAG Heuer Monaco at Baselworld.
The watch is very similar to the 40th anniversary TAG Heuer Monaco released this time last year, with the only real difference- apart from the colour of the dial- being that this Monaco uses the new, larger 39mm case from the Calibre 12 Monaco, rather than the 38mm of the 40th anniversary model.
The hands, pushers and leather strap seem to be identical, and I assume that this will use the same Calibre 11 movement.
No word on pricing or timing yet, but it will probably be a Q4 10 watch rather than something that will be in the stores shortly.
At this stage, the watch will be released in a limited edition of 1,860.
These photos were shot through glass and with lots of overhead light, so its difficult to properly capture the colour and finish of the dial- its more textured and grained that these photos would indicate.
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Having bought you the first images of the Pendulum movement, we can now share with you the very first photos of the TAG Heuer Grand Carrera Pendulum and its secret- this watch does not have a hairspring to regulate the movement- instead, it uses magnets.
This explains why TAG Heuer have joined forces with Tesla, because Telsa is not only the name of a car company, but also the name of the units of magnetic force- so a nice tie-in.
The Pendulum concept started about four years ago and is still in concept form- expect it to take a while for the technology to be ready for production, just as was the case with the Monaco V4 movement.
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TAG Heuer have added a PVD diver to the Aquaracer range, with the release of the Aquaracer 500m Full Black.
Not officially part of the Basel collection, the Full Black will be released later this year
The Full Black features a finely brushed titanium case with black PVD coating and bright yellow/ green lume markers, that don’t show up that well on this photo ( in fact, these are pretty ordinary photos taken through glass, so they don’t really do justice to the colours of the watch).
The watch has all the 500m Aquaracer signatures- the cyclops date at 9 o’clock, the helium escape valve and the vertical stripes on the dial.
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The much talked-about TAG Heuer Carrera Calibre 1887 will finally be unveiled at Basel tomorrow. The new model is a successful evolution of the exiting Carrera CV2017, and of course is fitted with TAG Heuer’s new movement.
Of course, there is a separate and very interesting story to the Calibre 1887 itself, but for now let’s focus on the watch itself.
At launch there are two models available- white (CAR2111) and black (CAR2110) dial, both available with either a leather strap or a bracelet.
The first thing that you notice about the watch is how clean and simple the dial looks- this is a very classical watch without any gimmicks.
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Cheers Arno
