Intorducing The Vulcain Nautical Legacy by Massena LAB

For its latest collaboration watch, NYC-based design studio Massena LAB is teaming up with venerable, alarm-specialist watchmaker Vulcain, bringing its private deal with an emblematic model, the Cricket Nautical. This watch, which relied on the mannequin’s signature chiming complication, was considered one of many first of its type, merging diving credentials with the alarm attribute that proved to be extraordinarily wise underwater. These days and faithfully recreated by the mannequin, Massena LAB depends upon this technical base and offers it some retro, almost tropical touches in order so as to add some basic enchantment, ensuing on this new Vulcain Nautical Legacy Massena LAB.

As we’ve outlined in a present article regarding the primary mannequin of this watch, reverse to well-liked notion, sound travels successfully underwater. As such, with the arrival {of professional} and newbie diving inside the late Nineteen Fifties, the alarm movement would flip into a reasonably wise safety attribute for divers who wished not solely to hint their diving events and signal when it was time to re-surface. Whereas the concept of an alarm dive watch was first created by Jaeger-LeCoultre, with the Memovox Deep Sea in 1959, Vulcain, considered one of many most necessary specialists of this chiming function (since 1947 and the Cricket watch) acquired right here shut second in 1961 with the Cricket Nautical, outfitted with a “triple case once more” that acted as a resonance chamber, to amplify the sound underwater.

This watch was not merely an prepare of vogue nonetheless the outcomes of study carried out by three passionate divers; Hannes Keller, a Swiss deep-sea diving pioneer, Max-Yves Brandily, an explorer and filmmaker, and Arthur Droz, a nationwide licensed diving trainer. Together with the alarm function, the trio added a system for determining decompression events constructed correct into the dial. So to say, the distinctive Vulcain Cricket Nautical was pretty a piece of engineering. Ultimate 12 months, Vulcain, which fits by means of its resurgence, launched once more the concept in a reliable re-edition. A definite phase, cool and ultra-focused model, it is now used as a base by Massena LAB to ship one factor way more retro-styled.

Massena’s work is normally seen on the dial of what’s proper right here named the Vulcain Nautical Legacy. Which signifies that the technical base stays unchanged – as is normally the case with watches completed in collaboration with this design studio. It thus begins with a reasonably sizeable case of 42mm, manufactured from stainless-steel, and using an atypical three-crown/pusher construction – a crown for the movement, a pusher for the alarm and a crown for the rotating dial. Considering the combination of 300m diving capacities and the presence of a closed “triple case once more” showing as a resonance chamber and allowing for the alarm to be loud adequate to be heard underwater, plus the presence of an ultra-domed sapphire crystal on excessive, the Nautical Legacy isn’t skinny… Thickness is measured at 17.5mm, similar to the fundamental re-edition and likewise reliable to the proportions of the historic model.

The watch is powered by the manual-wound Cricket Alarm Calibre V10, a movement with historic relevance as a result of the direct descendants of the distinctive Cricket movement created in 1947. It has a twin-barrel construction (one for timekeeping, one for the alarm) and the fundamental buzzing hammer system for the alarm. It moreover retains the Exactomatic, a patented gadget to equalise the friction on the balance-wheel axis in all positions by modifying the Incabloc endstones. Working at a sluggish tempo of two.5Hz, it’ll most likely retailer as a lot as 42 hours of vitality when completely wound.

Let’s now switch to what items this Massena LAB model apart… The dial. The studio has given it a wonderful stronger basic look, someway a tropical sort with a rich, chocolate-brown dial with a brushed finish. One different distinctive part, the arms have been completely redesigned and are distinctive to this Massena LAB collaboration – baton-style hand for the hours, large arrowhead for the minutes, purple arrow alarm hand, and lollipop hand for the centre seconds. These, and the hour markers, are full of patina-like beige lume.

Together with the time, the diving bezel and alarm function, the Vulcain Nautical Legacy incorporates a rotating dial (used with the 4 o’clock crown) showing as a decompression desk, an invention of the Hannes Keller workers revealed by means of an aperture on the dial. As quickly as set appropriately (determining the dimensions and depth of the meant dive), this scale reveals the diver for what variety of minutes they should stop at 9, six, and three meters sooner than returning to the ground – we now have outlined intimately how this watch works on this text.

Worn on a selected rubber strap, the Vulcain Nautical Legacy Massena LAB is a restricted model of 25 gadgets. It is now obtainable at MassenaLAB.com and is priced at USD 4,950.