They say there's nothing new under the sun, but the world of haute chronologie still has a few tricks up its sleeve. In a real first, Swiss watchmaker Krayon has released the Everywhere – the first watch that not only displays the times of sunrise and sunset, but can be set by the wearer for any location on Earth instead of for a specific location that is hardwired into it at the factory.
Clocks and watches that can show the time of sunrise and sunset are nothing new. In fact, they date back many centuries. And today, anyone can enjoy such information by simply downloading a convenient app onto one's phone. However, mechanical watches suffered from one great drawback. They could only be made to show sunrise and sunset for a specific location that was built into them by the watchmaker, so buying such a watch and then moving to another town was an expensive aggravation.
According to Krayon, the Everywhere watch has achieved a first thanks to its Universal Sunrise Sunset (USS) calibre. Comprising 595 components and 85 jewels, the movement measures only 35.40 mm in diameter and 6.50 mm thick. It uses four differentials and 84 gear assemblies powered by an automatic 22 k white gold microrotor with a 72-hour reserve to combine the parameters needed to calculate when the sun will rise and set: the latitude, longitude, time zone, month, and date.
Normally, the geographical information would be built right into the gearing, but in the Everywhere all five of these parameters can be programmed into the watch by the wearer simply pressing the stud on the case to select the mode, then manipulating the crown to make the needed adjustments. Once these are entered, the USS movement uses an equation of time and a secret function known only to the maker to calculate each parameter in turn to produce the results for both sunrise and sunset.
After it has carried out the calculations, the results are displayed on the dial on a two-color ring with a yellow or pink band to represent the hours of daylight and a darker band to represent night. Where these areas converge are sunrise and sunset. As the seasons pass, the length of these bands change as the days grow and shrink. Meanwhile, a blue arrow on the dial shows the path of the sun in the sky.
Also on the white gold dial with hand-polished chamfers and micropainted sapphire display discs are the indicators for the hours on a 24-hour scale, the minutes, the date, the month, the longitude, the latitude, the time zone, daylight savings time, and the function selected for adjustment.
All of this is sealed in a 42-mm pink or white gold case with sapphire crystals front and reverse and fastened with a hand-stitched black alligator strap with matching gold pin buckle. Personalization and a baguette diamond bezel are also available. It is, however, not an impulse buy with prices starting at CHF600,000 (US$616,000).
Source: Krayon