japanese weekend maternity clothes chains an leather straps The Wristwatch As a Jewel - The Timeless Gift of Love

japanese weekend maternity clothes chains an leather straps The Wristwatch As a Jewel - The Timeless Gift of Love
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Its a bit tricky talking about fancy wristwatches chez nous. Fact is, Ive got a drawer full of Rolexes, Omegas and Tags, but theyre all fake, the result of two or three holidays in exotic places where such things are traded by street vendors for very little money. Needless to say the Business Manager (Mrs P) wants me to get rid of them.Nor did it help when, about 15 years ago, I went to an auction in which the redundant stock of a retired jeweller was being sold off. There were literally hundreds of watches and and I couldnt resist bidding on a his n hers pair of Zenith battery-driven jobs, which were cheap but somewhat more money than I thought shed think I should have spent.So, not wishing to face her wrath on returning home, I did a deal with a woman I worked with in the office. We split the cost and she paid me half for the ladys version. It was a mistake. I should have faced the wrath and given the BM the other watch. Shes never let me forget it.It doesnt help that Valentines Day is also her birthday. So, I thought Id cast around to see if I could find a fancy watch that she might appreciate. I sense its going to be a long search. With real Rolexes, Omegas and Tags costing a small fortune for what is, after all, just a means to tell the time, my thoughts turned to buying her what I suppose is called a dress watch, that is something of a fashion statement as well.Needless to say, with champagne taste but beer pocket money it will be none of the ones pictured here. These arent just watches, theyre jewel-encrusted miniature works of art, handmade by craftsmen, that not only sport some of the most complex, precision made movements, but also combinations of precious metals and gemstones that take their eye-watering values into another time zone.Interestingly enough, the first watches were made by locksmiths and not surprisingly, some of the best were based in the Bavarian city of Nuremberg, historically the craft and industrial heart of Europe, which was also the home of early diamond cutters. The invention of the coil spring made the manufacture of portable clocks possible and the first truly portable watch is said to have been made in the early 16th century.In her will dated 1566, Mary Queen of Scots left Darnley, her second husband and father of James I, a watch garnished with 10 diamonds, two rubies and a cord of gold. Wristwatches were somewhat later invention, the first appearing in around 1790.Ingenious fantasy watches were all the rage among the wealthy during the 18th century. The fops in European Courts vied with each other to be dressed in the most flamboyant fashion possible and to sport the most outrageous jewellery that each could afford. The individual who turned up with a gold and red enamel strawberry on the end of a chain or ribbon which opened to reveal a watch was probably highly jealous of another modelled as an exquisite tiny mandolin in blue enamel, set with a gold flower and a delicate motif of a fragment of music manuscript.The fashion continued even into the 19th century, when one of the most interesting examples Ive ever seen was a watch shaped like a beetle with articulating wings and ruby eyes, all set in gold set with rose diamonds.The first wristwatch proper for ladies did not appear until about 1900 and it was something of a cheat. Previously, fob watches suspended from delicate chains or else brooches to be pinned like a corsage to a dress or coat were a womans best way to keep track of the passage of time. Eventually, these became small enough to be attached to a leather strap and worn around the wrist. Indeed, some can be found in both gold and silver which were capable of being one or the other, the brooch pin being detachable.However, almost all were invariably in plain, utilitarian cases with little or no hint of decoration save perhaps for simple engine turning or enamel highlighting. All that changed after the First World War. In the same way that jewellery manufacture became far more adventurous after the lean years of the early 20th century, plain watches and styles became more exotic and desirable. Women took their jewellery out of safekeeping in bank vaults, previously scarce precious metals became more readily available and the Art Deco era beckoned.It was a period of decadence and it lasted until the 1930s, during which time women gain the right to vote and with emancipation came short dresses and bobbed hair, red lipstick and the swathe of distinctive motifs and design elements which can be seen in both jewellery and wristwatches: shapes were geometric, influenced by the Cubist movement; diamonds were set in platinum, the only contrast from white on white being the addition of emeralds, sapphires and rubies and influences from Egypt followed the discovery of King Tutankhamens tomb in 1923. The diamond-encrusted cocktail watch was a must-have with pieces by Cartier, Tiffany and Van Cleef & Arpels among the most desirable.However, it was probably in the Sixties that the watch as a jewel finally arrived and while it would be wrong to claim that accurate timekeeping became of secondary importance to manufacturers and their customers, it is certainly true that in many cases it is only the two hands of the watch that indicate its true purpose. Favourite dial shapes remain the circle and the oval, the latter worn either vertically or horizontally, but they are often devoid of numbers, only rarely have a date aperture or seconds sweep hand and in some cases, even the winding button is hidden.Among the worlds most desirable watches are those by Piaget, a company founded in 1874 by Georges Edouard Piaget, a farmer in La-Cote-aux-Fees, a village in the Jura mountains of Switzerland. In 1960, Valentin Piaget created the flattest self-winding movement in the world for its time -- it measured 2.3 mm -- enabling the company to produce watches with extremely slim profiles including some that were made to represent coins. The real breakthrough came when it launched the first dials to be made from hard stone such as elegant black onyx, turquoise, translucent opal, malachite, coral, tawny tiger eye and lapis lazuli.Using platinum or 18 carat white and yellow gold, the watch cases and straps were embellished with all manner of precious gemstones in designs which, if youll pardon the pun, remain timeless. Jackie Kennedy and Gina Lollobrigida were among the jet-setting customers who sported Piaget watches and helped the luxury brand achieve international recognition. Just dont mention it to the BM.





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