Watch Casebacks: Artistry and Movement Finishing

Modernahab, a discerning collector, shares an insightful exploration into the often-overlooked artistry of watch case backs. This piece highlights how the reverse of a timepiece can be as compelling as its dial, showcasing intricate movements, unique complications, and thoughtful design elements. Modernahab's personal selections demonstrate that a watch's 'backside' can offer both aesthetic pleasure and practical utility, inviting readers to appreciate the full horological experience.

Any among us may have admired a good backside (on any gender) now and then. Having a less-than-compelling one myself (trust me on this), I perhaps compensate by acquiring watches with interesting reverses. Mind you, I am no connoisseur of haute horlogerie movement finishing, and for the most part, that’s not what I’m talking about here. No, my subject today is watches with rear ends I enjoy contemplating, for whatever reason. There are several watches with compelling backsides in my possession, but I’m going to leave out a few with shaped movements for a later piece on shaped watches.

Jaeger-LeCoultre Duomètre Unique Travel Time

First up: the JLC Duomètre Unique Travel Time – aka, the UTT. As it happens, the flipside of the UTT features both fine finishing and fascinating movement architecture. Finishing quality on JLC movements can vary widely by collection, in my experience, but the Duomètre line aspires to a level of haute horlogerie finishing not necessarily seen in other JLC collections. To begin with, the plates and bridges on the 54 jewel, 34 mm caliber 383 are decorated with a rayons de gloire pattern that radiates from the balance wheel. Plates and bridges sport polished beveled edges, polished screw heads are countersunk, and wheels/barrels are sunburst finished. Engraved labels designate the two mainspring barrels. Moreover, caliber 383 incorporates German silver (a warm-hued nickel alloy), which I have not previously encountered in a Jaeger-LeCoultre movement.

In addition to an interesting and well-finished movement, the UTT features the engraved names of world cities with their +/- GMT location around the perimeter of its case back. I actually find this useful, insofar as the polar projection GMT subdial up front is marked in +/- GMG, which doesn’t mean all that much to me intuitively. Having the handy reference as to where that translates to is a definite help.

Jaeger-LeCoultre Reverso Chronographe Rétrograde

While on the subject of Jaeger-LeCoultre, I have to mention the ca. 1996 limited edition rose gold Reverso Chronographe Rétrograde. I know I said I was leaving shaped watches aside for the time being, but I can’t talk about backsides without mention of the Reverso. So, sue me if I talk about the Chronographe Rétrograde again at some later time. Frankly, it’s exceptional enough to merit the extra attention.

The story of how the Reverso design originated to protect the crystal and dial from impact during polo and other active sports is well-known, but it took quite a while for JLC to capitalize on the two-sided case by displaying complications on the verso. The watershed in this regard was the collection of limited edition complicated Reversos in rose gold cases released sequentially during the 1990s to commemorate the Reverso line’s 60^th anniversary. Included, among others, where a perpetual calendar, a minute repeater, a GMT, and a tourbillon, alongside the Chronographe Rétrograde. All of these are exquisite, but the chronograph has always been my favorite. For one thing, who besides JLC has done a shaped, manual-wind, integrated column wheel chronograph caliber in recent memory? But then, on top of that, JLC chose to expose the caliber 829 by foregoing a dial and displaying the elapsed time on an engraved chapter ring for the chronograph seconds and a semi-circular retrograde scale for the chronograph minutes. The exposed plates and bridges are gilded and decorated in côtes de Genève, with blued screws and jewels providing color accents. The whole thing adds up to a mesmerizing display of miniature engineering that never ceases to fascinate me.

A. Lange & Sohne Langematik, Ref. 301.027

I realize as I write that I’m showing both my age and an embarrassing degree of nostalgia, what with all of these neo-vintage watches. Yet I can’t keep myself from mentioning the early production 37 mm white gold A. Lange & Sohne Langematik, Ref. 301.027, introduced in 1997 and produced until the mid-2000s, when it gave way to a somewhat larger iteration. The understated – even austere – dial on the Langematik gives no hint as to what lies beneath the sapphire case back. Lange caliber L921 is, to be frank, one of the most beautiful movements I have ever seen.

The warm luster of German silver enlivens the diagonally Glashütte ribbed plates and bridges, which are punctuated with blued screws and outlined in brightly polished chamfered edges. While the L921 lacks the screwed-in gold chatons found on some other Lange calibers, it does feature the brand’s characteristic hand-engraved balance cock and gooseneck fine adjustment. Then there’s the rotor. Oh, that rotor! In 21 karat gold, and bearing a platinum weight, the rotor is engraved in deep relief, with a pebbled surface beneath the “Sax-O-Mat” and “A. Lange & Sohne” text. I claim no expertise, but the sheer quality and finesse of decoration on this caliber rates with the very best I’ve seen, especially among brands with significant serial production numbers. What a backside!

Grand Seiko Evolution 9 Hi-Beat “White Birch” SLGW003

OK, enough with the turn of the century, and onto something (very) modern. If you told me, say, five years ago, that I’d be taken by the rear view of a watch from Grand Seiko, I would have probably choked myself laughing. Then came the Evolution 9 line, with its new Hi-Beat calibers, and lo: Grand Seiko upped its movement finishing game to something more consistent with its much-lauded dials and cases!

I would consider finishes and decoration on Grand Seiko’s previous movements “adequate” for industrial-level standards, but entirely incommensurate with the detailed execution of its dials or with its finely worked and meticulously polished cases. The automatic caliber 9SA5 and hand-wound caliber 9SA4 inside the Evolution 9 SLGH and SLGW models changed all that. Aside from their 80-hour power reserve, high frequency, and innovative dual impulse escapement, both movements are decorated with well-executed diagonal striping, complemented by countersunk polished screws and polished chamfered edges. Polishing on the components is (finally) in line with that we’ve become accustomed to on Grand Seiko’s cases, hands, and indices. In combination with the elegant movement geometry, the result is the best-looking backside I’ve seen on a Grand Seiko to date – especially in the hand-wound caliber 9SA4, with fully exposed plates and bridges and a rear-mounted power reserve display.

Having elevated their movement finishing standards in the Evolution 9 collection, Grand Seiko needs only to do something about its bracelets to solidify what, even at recent higher prices, remains a solid value proposition compared to similar quality Swiss brands. I have always found Grand Seiko’s bracelets clunky in design and pedestrian in apparent quality compared to the rest of the watch, and the first thing I’ve done with each Grand Seiko I’ve purchased is to yank off the bracelet and replace it with a high-quality bespoke strap that’s more closely aligned with the watch’s quality.

H. Moser Venturer Small Seconds 

Here’s another watch where a distinctive dial and case account for much of its appeal, but as opposed to Grand Seiko, I’ve always found the movements on H. Moser & Cie. watches of proportional interest appearance-wise to the fumé dials and sinuously sculpted cases. Looking at the rear end of the Venturer Small Seconds, you’ll find the hand-wound Moser caliber HMC 327, its broad bridges decorated with meticulously applied diagonal striping in an idiosyncratic thick-and-thin alternating pattern that I’ve only seen on Moser calibers. The flat surfaces are accented with countersunk polished screws and very brightly polished chamfered edges. Visible wheels are decorated with a sunburst finish. Opposite the crown lies a discreet power reserve indicator with a blued steel hand and, adjacent to that, the elegantly mounted modular Straumann escapement employed in Moser’s movements. Especially appealing to me is the elaborate Moser shield logo engraved in loving detail at approximately 6 o’clock.

Piaget Altiplano Ultimate Automatic

It’s not always the movement finishing or architecture that captures my attention on a watch’s rear end, though. A solid case back, well-executed and nicely decorated, can hold great appeal as well. You could think of the good ones as really cool tattoos. The engraved solid back on Piaget’s Altiplano Ultimate Automatic is a case in point. (Bad, bad pun!) It’s not as if there’s nothing to look at on Piaget’s ultra-thin caliber 910P. It’s just that it’s all visible from the front, as the case back on the Altiplano Ultimate Automatic doubles as the mainplate. Crisp text in elegant fonts, the elaborate Piaget crest engraved into a circular brushed 18 karat gold surface, and the sloped, brightly polished perimeter band that encompasses them render the exposed surface a backside worth looking at.

Cartier Santos-Dumont XL, Steel and Rose Gold LE

Much the same could be said for the limited edition Cartier Santos-Dumont XL, with a stainless steel case, polished rose gold bezel, and complimentary salmon dial. The vertically brushed surface of the Santos-Dumont’s broadly beveled case back is engraved with one of the namesake aviator’s early flying machines, all cleanly picked out in opaque black. I’d certainly rather look at that than the disproportionately small, circular Piaget-sourced 430 MC movement that powers the watch. Indeed, many a watch fitted with a too-small or indifferently finished movement would look better from behind were this approach more widely adopted.

Zenith Pilot Type 20 Extra Special

A great positive example is my wife’s Zenith Pilot Type 20 Extra Special. As the 26.60 mm in-house Zenith caliber Elite 679 inside this watch would look comically out of proportion with the 40 mm case (and that’s the “small” model!), Zenith was wise to decorate the vintage-looking patina case back with engraved text and a large crest.

Butt-Ugly or Ugly Butt? Hermès Arceau L’Heure de la Lune

For a glaring negative example: the otherwise gorgeous Hermès L’Heure de la Lune, which “showcases” the 26 mm caliber H1837 (plus module) in its 43 mm case, to utterly ridiculous effect. Rubbing salt in the wound are the workaday edge treatments and Hermès’s stamped letter “H” decoration on the bridges, which I find both crass and clumsy. (Somehow, Cartier does better with its trademark back-to-back “C” decoration – possibly due to finer execution.)

I feel Hermès missed a real opportunity here. They could have taken a page from Zenith’s playbook and used a solid gold case back, adorning it with something relevant and clever – perhaps some variant of the Pegasus-on-the-moon motif that appears on the dial. Of course, if Grand Seiko could up its movement decoration game, so could Hermès, were they inclined to do so.

In Parting

This last gripe has me thinking that I ought to get my curmudgeon on and share some other “fly in the ointment” examples when the (bad) mood strikes me. ;-D

Meantime, I’ll continue, dirty old man that I am, to ogle seductive timepiece backsides.