Posts Tagged ‘Cartier’
October 8, 2009 at 8:29 pm
Cartier released the Santos 100 in memory of the first wristwatch in the world
- Tags: Cartier, Santos, three faces
We are so interesting in wristwatch, but I think many wristwatch fans aren’t clear about the invention of wristwatch. Let us review this special story. At a party in Paris in the early 1900s, Alberto Santos-Domont explained to his friedn Louis Cartier how one cannot tell the time on a pocket watch when his two hands are busy. Cartier was very seriously about this request in 1904. With Edmond Jaeger’s help, he created the first wristwatch prototype that would enable his friedn to tell the time without taking his hands off the flying control.
Today, the spirit of the first unique Santos de Cartier is echoed in the unique Only Watch white gold Santos triple 100. The case of this watch is based on the famous Santos case invented in 1904, which, to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Santos, was reworked in 2004 – hence the name Santos 100.
The Santos 100 has three different faces: the first being white with Cartier black Roman numerals; the second, totally engraved with an exotic dragon and a third position, halfway between the two faces, offers a totally transparent view of the unique highend manufacture square skeleton movement, which has been 100% developed at the Cartier manufactory in La Chaux-de-Fonds.
When you turn the crown, the dial itself is made up of different facets and the facets turn.
Finding a way to incorporate the Roman numerals with essential elements of the movement is the main difficulty in developing this concept of a special skeleton movement. With a skeleton movement, watchmakers normally take a standard movement and work on it to achieve a version that is as minimal as possible. The square Santos 100 skeleton has been specifically designed as a skeleton movement. This created another problem at the development stage of this watch. Since this skeleton movement was intended to be very pure with a lot of “air” around it, the Cartier team had to redesign the bridges in order to ensure that they could support the movement.
Being the frist wristwatch to be remembered, the Santos 100 is worth to be owned, moreover when you buy it, you are alse buy a unique Cartier with three different faces of the watch.