Are we pumped for SIHH 2018 yet? Just like the “holiday shopping season” and beginning around the same time, it seems like the new-product announcements get earlier every year. With still more than a month to go, the 2018 models that we will get to see in Geneva in January have already started coming in. The Salon International de la Haute Horlogerie (SIHH) watch industry trade show, just like its organizing body the Fondation de la Haute Horlogerie (FHH), has continued to grow and evolve each year, adding more brands as well as a day where the show is open to the public for the first time in 2017 – this time around, it will be Friday, January 19th, 2018. Now with a total of 35 brands, SIHH 2018 promises even more variety than in previous years.
You already know that SIHH is one of the two most important events for the watch industry, as its exhibitors – while much fewer than at the biggest industry trade show, Baselworld – represent many major and influential brands, and this is the time of year when they introduce their most important new products. Vis-à-vis Baselworld – where around 300 brands represent the breadth of the watch industry from high-end and mainstream to obscure startups – SIHH has always carefully maintained an image of exclusivity and “prestige.”
So, while a few brands do introduce models in the “mid-level luxury” range that the average person might be able to consider saving up for and possibly actually wearing… you can expect a lot of skeletonization, avant-garde designs, artisanal techniques and haute horology finishing, “high complications,” precious materials, and stratospheric prices. Haute horlogerie is in the name, after all. It has largely been a spectator’s show for fans of high-end watchmaking, but with recent industry trends emphasizing more “down-to-earth” (it’s all relative) models, some balance and variety can at least be hoped for.
SIHH 2018’s 35 Exhibiting Brands
The Richemont Group along with some independent brands long represented the handful of SIHH exhibitors. However, the show’s 2016 edition added a “Carré des Horlogers” section with nine “artisan-creators and independent workshops” and expanded that number in 2017. This year, the Carré des Horlogers brands are up to no fewer than 17, with the primary exhibitors (referred to as “Historic Maisons”) at 18 for a total, again, of 35. The primary exhibitors are joined by Hermes, and the Carré des Horlogers adds five brands with Armin Strom, DeWitt, Ferdinand Berthoud, Élégante by F.P.Journe, and Romain Gauthier. See the full list of exhibitors in the image above.
From a media perspective, Baselworld has tended to spread our resources very thinly in past years with simply too much to cover at once, so with some prominent brands having moved from Baselworld to SIHH, we can hope for some balance between the shows. Around 20,000 visitors are expected this year, and the FHH promises improved facilities and connectivity in order to make our job of bringing you high quality content more efficient – so we’ll see what that’s like in January. That’s just a glimpse into our point of view in preparing for the show.
We’ll continue providing news of new products ahead of the show – if mostly only renders and official product images from the brands with basic information before being able to see the watches in person to photograph and evaluate them in their glorious and gritty reality. SIHH 2018 runs from January 15th to the 19th, and again, the last day is open to the public with tickets on sale at the SIHH website. sihh.org
The chronograph has a 30-minute totalizer up top along with a 12-hour totalizer at six o’clock, and there’s a running seconds enroll at nine o’clock. Purists may be annoyed by the date window at three o’clock, but let us remember this is an opinion meant for general consumers and most customers still ask for watches that reveal the date. There are just two dial color choices — sunburst black and sunburst silver. Each provides contrasting paths for the chronograph sub-registers along with a contrasting rehaut with the more detailed timing track on it. The implemented even numerals stand a wonderful height off the dial itself and also have a vertically brushed finish that makes them look really high-end. Together with the vivid red chronograph seconds hand, the contrasty dial makes reading at a glance quickly really easy. It is nice to realize that Montblanc actually thought about making this type of sensible driving chronograph.Looking in the remainder of the opinion, you keep finding more considerate details. The lugs are partially pierced, with one curved opening on the side with the pushers and two smaller cut-outs on the opposite side. Talking of, these pushers are surrounded with little black knurled rims which match the crown and the border of this polished black porcelain bezel. Despite being a large sports chronograph, this view exhibits great attention to detail and is clearly trying to give wearers a lot to appreciate that they wont find in the competition.Turning the watch over you’ll find a screw-down caseback with a smoked sapphire window for looking in the motion. Sure, the decoration on the caliber is not much to write home about, but there’s very little reason to not offer you a sapphire back on a watch like this. The motion is the Montblanc caliber MB 25.07, which is their version of the Sellita SW500. It’s an automatic chronograph movement using a 46-hour power book, 25 stones, and a frequency of 28,800 vph.