BaselWorld, the world’s most important watchmaking and jewellery fair, will take place for the 40th time from March 8th to 15th 2012. A real highlight, the show is an opportunity to affirm the upward-moving export trend, but above all to reveal the most recent creations of Swiss Exhibitors which rival each other in ingenuity and skill.

And there’s no shortage of choice! From the most classical to the completely futurist, from feminine to virile and from quartz to mechanical, the timepieces provide a veritable anthology of techniques and emotions flirting with both innovation and tradition. While certain trends naturally develop year after year, Swiss watchmakers studiously avoid creating their models according to fleeting fashions. A watch is above all the story of a lifetime.

The vintage look and spirit

Vintage has been in the spotlight for several years already, reviewed and amended according to contemporary aesthetic codes. These “new vintage” creations revisit historic models with a glorious past. Thus, the 1950s and 60s are once again blooming on our wrists, albeit with great sobriety. Aesthetics are simplified, with frequently ultra-thin cases, useful functions and comfort being the absolute must. This return to roots also requires a re-think of mechanisms to improve them even more. The automatic movement is enjoying its finest hour. It is used in various additional modules, beating to new rhythms and treated to every possible attention on the decoration front.

From “new vintage” to 100% futurist

BaselWorld is also an opportunity to get to know timepieces from “another dimension”. Welcome to a world where avant-garde rules supreme and where classic references have no place, giving way to models distinguished by their innovative architecture and extraordinary displays. Stunning techniques combining titanium, ceramics, carbon fibre, rubber… Liquid, solid, air: all conventional limits are surpassed and any sense of propriety has gone by the wayside! Moreover, futuristic timepieces rhyme with unlikely associations, such as sapphire crystals serving as case middles or dials, opaque glass discs masking the time, or mechanisms that are alternately revealed and hidden.

Source: Swisstime

www.swisstime.ch