Anyone going on a pilgrimage to the centre of German fine watchmaking – the valley town of Glashütte – invariably gets there via the city of Dresden which is 30km away, if only to switch trains or get a transfer from the airport.
Of course, if you can find the time, Dresden is well worth a visit in its own right. Known for its beautifully restored baroque quarter – including the Frauenkirche Lutheran church – as well as its Academy of Fine Arts and spectacular setting on the banks of the River Elbe, Dresden has been described as the “Florence on the Elbe” and the “Jewel Box” of Germany.
This city serving as the state capital of Saxony also played a key role in the development of Glashütte as a horological hub in the mid-1800s. One of the reasons that the four founding fathers of Glashütte watchmaking – Ferdinand Adolph Lange, Moritz Grossman, Julius Assmann and Adolf Schneider – picked this locale to establish a concentration of watchmaking savoir-faire was because of the nearby clockmaking know-how that Dresden had cultivated.
As a tribute to the majesty of Dresden and its historical ties to Glashütte’s success story, watchmaker Glashütte Original has chosen to honour the city by presenting a special 25-piece PanoMaticInverse limited edition in platinum. And it features breath-taking hand-engravings depicting Dresden and all its delights on its dial and back.
Back to Front
A quick recap: Glashütte Original’s PanoMaticInverse is the automatic, inverted interpretation of the brand’s asymmetric time-and-big-date model from its iconic Pano collection. It is “inverted” in that the balance wheel, its bridge and the movement’s three-quarter plate have all been swapped around so they are now on the face of the watch instead of at the back.
While that switch helps add some mechanical animation to the front side – with the oscillating balance fully on show – the rhodium-treated surfaces of the three-quarter plate and balance bridge can also serve as an ample canvas for various artistic crafts.
For this special edition, Glashütte Original has chosen the medium of hand-engraving to decorate the dial and back plates of the movement, asking its artisans to portray various sights whose outlines mark out Dresden’s cityscape.
On the face of the watch, we find the roof of the city’s Academy of Fine Arts and its winged statue, plus the dome of the Frauenkirche, with a hot air balloon flying in the background. Meanwhile, the balance bridge is adorned with baroque motifs. And through the display back, under the skeletonised rotor, we can glimpse a representation of the promenade along the River Elbe, with the inclusion of subtle details like birds and clouds.
Understated Elegance
Obviously, with a creation like this, telling the time is almost a fringe benefit. In order to keep the spotlight on the stunning engravings, the off-centred hour-minute subdial and small seconds are displayed on a sapphire crystal structure that is transparent where the Roman numeral hours are and frosted for the minutes and seconds. Above, the skeletonised, blued hands manage to pop and match the surrounding blued screws. And powering the indications is the finely-finished, in-house self-winding Calibre 91-03 with 45-hour power reserve.
Given that the hand-engravings constitute a miniature work of art, the 42mm by 12.3mm case provides the perfect frame for it. Its clean lines and brushed and polish surfaces exude understated elegance. The brand has paired this sober housing with a navy Louisiana alligator leather strap with folding clasp in platinum to match the case material.
Limited to 25 pieces and priced just below CHF 50,000, this PanoMaticInverse Tribute to Dresden limited edition is certainly one of Glashütte Original’s more costly pieces, but that figure is more than justified in all the artisanal goodness going on here.
For more information, please visit the Glashütte Original website. Or better still, discover this watch in the metal at the brand’s boutique located in – you guessed it – Dresden, just a stone’s throw from the city’s Frauenkirche!
