IWC celebrates 150 years at SIHH

A hundred and fifty years is no small feat, and IWC is celebrating this milestone with a special Jubilee Collection, 27 limited-edition timepieces based on existing models in the Portugieser, Portofino, Pilot’s Watches and Da Vinci families. The full collection will only be unveiled at the Salon International de la Haute Horlogerie (SIHH) later this month, but we have a small taster of four of the novelties, plus an extraordinary wrist watch based on an archival pocket watch from 1884.

Let’s start with this most interesting offering: the IWC Tribute to Pallweber Edition “150 Years”, which displays the time in a digital display format. The patent pending design shows the hours and minutes in large numerals on rotating discs on the white dial. The design is based on a pocket watch from 1884 that was already a revolutionary development for its time. The windows are labelled “Hours” and “Minutes”, as a tribute to F.A. Jones, the American watchmaker who founded IWC.

Then there’s the most complicated offering: the Portugieser Perpetual Calendar Tourbillon Edition “150 Years”, which combines for the first time in IWC history, a perpetual calendar and a tourbillon on the dial. The watch indicates the day, date, month, year, moon phase, seven-day power reserve and tourbillon, and runs on a new calibre, 51950. Only 50 timepieces are made.

There’s the big guy; the Portugieser Constant-Force Tourbillon Edition “150 Years” is beautiful, and at 46mm, a massive timepiece. Cased in platinum with a white lacquered dial and blued hands, the watch features a tourbillon at nine o’clock and a moon phase display at one o’clock that is accurate to one day in every 577.5 years. The watch is limited to just 15 pieces.

The most elegant is definitely the Da Vinci Automatic Moon Phase 36 Edition “150 Years”, done in a style IWC cultivated towards the end of the 1980s and 1990s. The model is not unlike existing Da Vinci Automatic Moon Phase models, but this version comes with a white lacquered dial, blued hands, and more importantly, the entire bezel, sides of the case and lugs are covered in 206 pure white diamonds amounting to 2.26 carats. Only 50 timepieces are made.

And last but not least, the most classic Da Vinci Automatic Edition “150 Years”. This watch, features a small seconds at six o’clock, rather than a central seconds hand and does not come with a date window like its predecessors. Cased in stainless steel, the watch comes in a gorgeous deep blue dial with a lacquered finish and rhodium-plated hands, and is powered by the new automatic calibre 82200, with the company’s signature Pellaton winding and a power reserve of 60 hours.

This article was updated on January 26