G99
13685
its arrived! the most beautiful piece of artwork ever to grace my wrist
before you get the pics and details here's my reasoning behind buying it................
as some of you will know i have recently liquidated a collection of over 200 military watches at auction in order to redirect my collection towards more modern pieces with either unusual dials like the Seiko Burger or rare and unusual movements like the UN freak. as the auction was highly successful i decided that as well as buying a new kitchen and having lots of building work done i wanted 1 more 'special' piece. i have spent some time looking and had pretty much decided on the Nivrel black dragon repeater until i happened upon a US based internet retailer following a post in another forum. this retailer sells German watches from various brands some of which i had never heard of, so i decided to browse the site. i clicked on this particular brands listings and was totally blown away by the picture in front of me. it was without doubt the most beautiful piece of craftsmanship i had ever seen. i looked at the pics, read the write up then looked at the price which was IMHO an absolute bargain. i kept going back to this watch and everytime i read more about the brand, the men behind it and the watch itself. i was more and more convinced that i had to own this watch, NOW! the Nivrel could be ordered at anytime, but this was special.
so now i'll show you the pics after which i'll paraphrase everything i've read about the brand and the watch. i cant point you to links as they all go to the retailers website so you'll have to rely on my literacy.
let me introduce you to the Greib & Benzinger 'Agassiz'.
it arrived well packed, but a day late. Federal Exasperation does it again.
a lovely piano laquered box with white outer cardboard. nothing special yet
this is a bit more like it. lovely interior, heavy on the branding. a teaser pic of the watch, but more to come later 
nice engraved plaque showing that this is the 10th watch built by hand in Germany
another plaque just in case we havent guessed who made it
first close up of the watch, stunning engraving......i hope you are in agreement on this
wow, check out the display back
a bit closer, the detail is amazing. lovely blued steel hands, how long did this take to do by hand??
you've probably guessed its an old movement, but note the swan neck micrometer regulater, blued screws and sparkling jewels.
nice onion crown, understated 42mm case with screw in strap bars. unfortunately the strap is Croc grain calf leather not the real thing.
finally a wristshot, nice size, very comfortable and amazingly lightweight. all the minute/second markers and brand names are printed on the inside of the crystal. the fleur de lys is their brand logo, you can just see it at 6 oclock. can you see why i'm find it so appealing?
Just for a laugh, heres some pics i took through my jewellers loupe. i didnt think they'd work, but i'm pleased with the result
first the Jewels
the regulater
finally the movements brand name.
OK, thats the pictures, now for some background on the masters behind it all..................
the watch is, as you can see, by Greib & Benzinger.
Hermann Greib is a German master watchmaker who specialises in the renovation and rebuilding of historic movements, clocks and watches. his workshops are actually in the Schloss Datzingen near Pforzheim. the castle has a huge collection of timepieces and at one time actually employed a live-in watchmaker to maintain them, a role now undertaken by Greib. Greib has and still does, work for some of the top watch companies in both Germany and Switzerland.
Jochen Benzinger, who also lives near Pforzheim, is a master engraver who specialises in the skeletonisation of watches and carving dials from gold. he also works for some the worlds top brands and coincidentally i believe he carves the dials of the Nivrel black dragon, my original choice.
Greib & Benzinger have been aquainted for a long time, but it was only recently that they decided to collaborate on these very special pieces.
the aim of the company is to produce watches using old historic movements which are rebuilt and hand engraved then released as one off unique pieces. Greib can spend many months looking through thousands of movements before he finds 'the jewel in the crown', a movement that is in such a condition as to make it suitable for rebuilding. he then strips the movement down to its component parts, cleans and rebuilds it until it is 'as new'. where possible he adds modern parts such as swan neck micrometer regulaters. the movement is then passed to Benzinger who hand engraves every part using tooling which is over 100 years old aquired from the Kollmar company when they closed down. only one piece is made using any particular movement and are only sold through the US retailer.
the first watch they produced used the calibre 51K from the Record watch company, the second used the IWC calibre 97. to date they have only produced 11 watches, this piece being the 10th.
now for the details of the actual watch........
the movement is a 17 jewel manual wind item by Agassiz, originally founded by Louis Agassiz and his brother Auguste in the St. Imier region of Switzerland in 1832. The company concentrated on producing extremely high quality movements which proved so successful that in 1867 it was re-christened Longines and became famous for supplying watches to military commanders.
they also continued to produce movements under the Agassiz name which were considered by many to be on par with Patek Philippe and Vacheron Constantin. Grieb was fortunate to locate an original Agassiz movement and has examined, cleaned, tested and when necessary restored every piece of this movement to ensure that the finished watch will meet his standards. The result is a limited edition series of 1 featuring a movement that is both historically important and completely reliable by today's standards. at this stage there is no reference to the date of the movement although it does have a serial number so i will research this point. i dont know what its VPH is, but it is probably 21,600 or slower.
the 3 piece 42mm case is made in Pforzheim, the home of German case making, and has a depth of 12.5mm. it has a nice polished bezel to the top and bottom with brushed sides.
the watch comes with a hand written letter(in German) from Greib and Benzinger. a nice personal touch i think.
to summarise, my feelings on this watch are that it is a stunning piece of handcrafted artwork with historic significance. you cant put a price on this sort of workmanship. its a piece that deserves to be passed down from generation to generation . i consider myself very lucky to have been given the opportunity to buy it and hope you enjoy the write up as much as i enjoy the watch. the fact that it is a unique one off piece is just a bonus and had very little bearing on my decision to purchase it.
BTW this watch appeared on page 132 of Feb 2008's edition of IW magazine.
enjoy
Graham
its arrived! the most beautiful piece of artwork ever to grace my wrist
Wow, congrats, Graham
