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Portofino Hand-Wound

The Portofino of 1984: The most elegant but also the most unassuming family of watches from IWC, the Portofino – the classic example of understatement – has decidedly stylish origins. Collectors know this: it is the Reference 5251 watch, which was still produced until the end of the 1990s, always in small quantities. It was impossible to conceal its direct descent from an elegant Lépine pocket watch produced for decades by IWC. For it was, as regards the case, nothing other than a pocket watch converted for use on the wrist, equipped with narrow strap brackets and a smaller crown, and with a very flat original pocket watch movement (95-calibre).

The Portofino family, established in 1984, was modelled exactly on its shape, thereby following on in the old tradition of elegant, reliable utility watches from IWC, frequently with a gold case. It represented the “satisfaction in wearing a small piece of gold on one’s arm every day”, as it was put on the occasion of its launch. The Portofino Hand-Wound, a dream of a watch with its narrow Roman numerals, small seconds display and, as a counterpart to it, a lunar phase display, does however take this opportunity to correct a “quick fix” used in the 1980s.

For Reference 5251, as it then was, had a charming flaw in that the movement used normally drove an open Lépine pocket watch. And that means that the winding shaft and small seconds display are located in a direct line, in contrast to the Savonette construction of the movement, where the winding shaft and small seconds display stand at an angle of 90° to one another. However, the ultraflat 95-calibre for Reference 5251 did not exist in the Savonette construction. And so here, the two indications of lunar phase display and seconds display ended up in a horizontal position at “3.00” and “9.00” – which looked interesting, but from the watchmaker’s point of view was not quite right. In the Vintage Portofino, this “positioning flaw” is remedied by the choice of the 98800-calibre Savonette movement. And through this, the lunar phase and seconds displays finally end up at their traditional places, at “12.00” and “6.00”.

The movement based on the 98 “Jones” calibre, with nickel-plated three-quarter plate of nickel silver, screw balance wheel, Breguet spring and elongated index, has undergone another fundamental optimization: the display precision of the lunar phase has been increased considerably compared with Reference 5251, and now deviates from the actual lunar sequence by only one day in 122 years. The lunar phase can moreover easily be corrected via the crown. The case size of 46 mm   corresponds to that of the original. Antireflective, crossed out sapphire glass and sapphire glass back invite you to enjoy this magnificent new example of a typical IWC wrist pocket watch on all sides.

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