Art as an ode to nature. Krayon celebrates the natural elements through Only Watch 2023, a timepiece designed to beguile collectors and lovers of rare refinements in search of a singular complication – the indication of sunrises and sunsets, at the precise location chosen by the wearer, anywhere in the world.
If its ingenuity and engineering prowess already suffice to set apart this hyper-complication, a bespoke ephemeris intimately linked to its wearer, the modernity of a case made of grade 5 titanium and the refinement of its pointillist dial truly make it a one-of-a-kind watch. An elegant timepiece that once again demonstrates, not only through the highest degree of hand-finishing, all the expertise of the independent Swiss watchmaker.
An exceptional dial, delicately hand-painted in miniature
A unique piece created for the Only Watch 2023 charity auction, Only Watch 2023 represents a 432-component ideal of serene artistry and technical sophistication. Following through on the Only Watch 2021 Edition, its exceptional dial blends engineering prowess with contemporary artistic inspiration.
This year, in hues of a multitude of blues, colour enhances purpose on the Anywhere watch, like an invitation to contemplation in the time before the sun rises or sets, as it shines with a thousand flashes of light on the surface of the water. This magical moment when nature, in suspension, awaits or relinquishes the light.
A hyper-complication around an ephemeris intimately linked to the wearer
What if you could tell the exact time of sunrise – or sunset – at a location of your choosing? Wherever you are, wherever you may choose to be, in body or spirit. Anywhere on the planet. Anywhere is a new complication in the world of fine watchmaking. Anywhere gives the time of our intimate relationship with the earth. Because, ultimately, there is no place more important than the one that is ours, the one before our eyes or in our mind’s eye, in our memories or in our heart.
With the tip of his pencil, Rémi Maillat, watchmaking engineer and founder of the brand, transforms unimagined concepts into real complexities of watchmaking art. His Anywhere creation indicates the length of the day and the time at which the sun rises and sets, while displaying the ephemeris at a point on the globe chosen personally by the wearer of the watch, placing them at the centre of a universal yet intimate watchmaking experience. This emotional dimension of time and space, at the intersection of subjective and objective geography, is where Krayon lives. Its interpretation of time takes the form of a watch that goes beyond convention and habit. Like mornings and evenings, never the same, always experienced in a personal way.
The beauty of rarity
Collectors and connoisseurs have always considered watches with dates or astronomical indications to be masterpieces of mechanical engineering not only because of their level of complexity, but also because their calendar displays are directly derived from astronomical observations made since the earliest civilisations.
For those who grasp its full scope, a calendar watch is a link with the cosmos, a connection all the more symbolic by the deep horological science behind it. The calendar is a mechanical solution to an astronomical problem. From ancient Egypt to Greece to Rome, from astronomers to mathematicians, and high priests, too, the history of the calendar has mainly revolved around the question of fitting the lunar and solar calendars into a scheme of whole numbers.
Only Watch 2023 indicates the hours and minutes by means of two hands placed at the centre of a dial that floats in the middle of the watch. It is surrounded by an annular display upon which circulates, in perpetual motion, a small sun that indicates the time over 24 hours. The ring-shaped zone consists of two sectors: a day sector (azure blue) and a night sector (dark blue), whose respective arc lengths indicate the sunrise and sunset times which can be read on the réhaut or flange.
To integrate the geographical factor, Krayon devised a mechanical positioning system, using rakes and rockers instead of a fixed cam. The relative position of the two sapphire discs is determined not only by the reference position, but also by the calendar. To this end, Anywhere shows the date and month in a subsidiary dial at 6 o’clock. It is a double calendar, with all months counting 31 days. It therefore requires only five quick, simple annual adjustments, made directly with the crown, in both directions. While these sources of inspiration are rooted in the past, Rémi Maillat has reinterpreted, even transcended them with a contemporary vision.
The heart of the watch
Krayon’s Only Watch 2023 is brought to life by the Calibre C030, a movement meticulously designed, developed and entirely assembled in Neuchatel, Switzerland by Rémi Maillat, Krayon’s founding watchmaker. It is the successor to the one developed for the model presented at the Only Watch charity auction in 2021.
With its (apparent) simplicity, width and slimness (only 5 mm), the movement’s manual winding mechanism and technical sophistication (432 components, 72 hours of operation) holds a particular fascination, surprising the beholder with the ability to define a point in space and time, geographically and temporally, to which only they are connected. True to a principle dear to Rémi Maillat, the wearer is given the ability to set the watch to the city or place of their choice with regard to the sunrise and sunset times at that precise location.
