The Low-Down

Forty years is practically half a lifetime, over which one can marvel at dramatic transformations and at the same time give thanks for some things which remain the same. It’s largely for the latter that Hublot is celebrating more than 40 years’ relationship with The Hour Glass, by releasing a special edition of its Classic Fusion 42mm, featuring stone dials.

Five stone dials are featured in the Classic Fusion 42mm Elements Special Edition for The Hour Glass: Tiger’s Eye with its warm, earth-toned striations; Red Jasper in a most auspicious blood red; Malachite with the gold accents bear a most pronounced 70s funk; Lapis Lazuli is darkly glamorous; and Turquoise which is exotic and plainly dreamy. Thankfully, the dials are unmarked, without apertures, that their natural beauty is able to shine through. As they are cut from the natural material, no watch is exactly alike.

The collection is cased in satin-finished and polished titanium, with King Gold (a Hublot concoction of gold in a warmer tone) for the crown, bezel lugs (ears) and H-shaped bezel screws. Between within is the self-winding HUB1100 with 42 hours of power reserve, based on the Sellita SW300-1.

The Elements Special Edition for The Hour Glass is limited to ten watches for each dial execution, and numbered in a special edition engraving on the periphery of the display back. The watches are available exclusively at The Hour Glass boutiques in Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand.

IMHO

Watchmaking companies tend to load up a mountain of specialist-curated words to explain their history, purpose and define their DNA which then in theory finds expression in the watches they produce. Congruence is a separate matter but being verbose is pretty much par for the course. Then there is Hublot and the genius behind its single-word imperative that is “Fusion”. It’s vague enough to encompass so much – anything that involves putting two things together to create something new – yet its significance is not diluted a single bit and it evokes something primal, potent and utterly electrifying courtesy of the word’s association in our minds with a nuclear reaction. What is Fusion? When two or more elements come together in such a reactive way that something thoroughly new is created as a result. It’s a beautiful concept especially in an undertaking like watchmaking that straddles the opposite poles of numerous axes: cutting edge materials and processes in the manufacture of an archaic centuries-old invention; pairing of precious metals with base materials in many of the iconic timepieces; watchmaking is rooted in national culture (Swiss, German, Japanese, etc.) yet international in reach from its earliest days.

Part of Hublot’s charm is in how the company has every kept “Fusion” on its mind to produce watches that align with its heritage and aspirations. The present collection is no exception, a marriage of natural materials in the unadorned stone dials they bear with the man-made genius and craft as embodied in a mechanical movement. A most commendable decision to leave the stone dials unmarked in this instance, and a date window would have been a criminal detraction of the immutable beauty of ageless stone.

Tech Specs

Movement: Self-winding HUB1100, 4Hz, power reserve of 42 hours
Functions: Hours, minutes, seconds
Case: 42mm, titanium, sapphire crystal front and back, special edition engraving
Strap: Black alligator strap with 5N gold stitching on black rubber with gold-plated stainless steel deployant clasp
Price: SGD 26,500 (Tiger’s Eye, Red Jasper, Malachite); SGD 28,500 (Turquoise, Lapis Lazuli)

More information at thehourglass.com