The Grand Lange 1 is a classic for a reason.
We'll talk about why coming up on Fresh from the Showcase from SwissWatchExpo.
Fresh from the Showcase at SwissWatchExpo.
If you're watching this video, you probably already have an understanding of the importance
and history of the A Lange & Sohne watch company.
This one is really a classic watch.
It's iconic.
And there's a lot of reasons why one of the reasons though, is that when you look at this
watch, it has a completely different style.
And look from the Swiss watch companies.
This company is German.
They were located in Glashutte, which isn't the Eastern half of Germany.
And right after world war II ended in 1945.
They were nationalized and shuttered and they didn't exist until 1990 when they were reformed
on the 145th anniversary of the founding of the company.
They immediately started on working on making a new and complicated watch, which became
the long a one.
And in 1994, we were, got the pleasure of getting to see that watch come out on the
market.
Uh, just a few years later in 2000, the company was acquired by the Richemont group.
Jaeger LeCoultre and Vacheron Constantin had actually helped A Lange get started again.
And so it made sense that they were part of the group that, uh, became part of Richemont
that year.
So they, there's still a small watch company.
They only make about 5,000 watches a year, and everything is still done very much by
hand.
They're very proud of the fact that they take meticulous detail and all of the hand work
that's done that no detail is too small for them to focus their attention on.
And they said that accuracy is not accurate enough that they really hold themselves to
a much higher standard than most of the watch world.
So when you look at this watch, it really is interesting when you think about how different
the style of it is, it's a fairly large watch.
This watch came out, like I said, in the early 1990s, but it was relaunched in 2013 in a
slightly smaller size.
This one is 40.5 millimeters in diameter, a fairly slim 8.8 thick.
And by making it just a little bit smaller, they made it a better size for most people.
And it makes it fit a little bit better, probably beneath shirt cuffs, if you're still wearing
those and our casual lifestyle that we have nowadays.
But the dial layout itself is just so unusual.
What you have here is a, a solid silver dial.
It's a Sterling silver dial that's then finished with the black finish.
Of course, it's got some various snailing lines around.
It's got different levels for the sub dials.
So it's really beautiful, but you can't help, but notice it's completely asymmetrical.
You have the hours and minutes, and this sub dial at nine o'clock the seconds and the small
sub dial here, four and five.
This is a power reserve indicator.
That states here at the bottom of the dial in German.
I won't attempt it, but it says that it has a 72 hour power reserve three days as you
wind the crown, which of course, doesn't screw down this being a dressier watch, you'll see
the power reserve indicator go up.
And then the really distinctive feature, this large date that is surrounded by a white gold
frame.
As you push this button here on the 10 o'clock side, you actually get that the chance to
just flip through those dates.
So it makes it super easy, um, really interesting design.
When you look at the way they finished it with the satin, the high Polish bezel high
polished case, caseback high Polish lugs, but with the satin in case it's really beautiful.
This one has the deployment buckle.
The previous models had a pen type buckle, but one of the stars of the show on this one
of course is the movement.
They do so many things by hand at A Lange & Sohne, that it really shows off here in
the back.
You can see that this movement was sized for this watch case.
It's almost like a big screen view of the exhibition case back.
The metal, when you look at it, it has a little bit of a golden look to it.
And that's because it's not made out of the rhodium plated bronze that you see from the
Swiss watch makers it's made out of German silver, which is an alloy of of zinc nickel
and copper.
So it's not silver at all, but it's something that is used a lot in musical instruments,
cause it doesn't tarnish.
So it's a great pick for a watch movement as well.
And you can see it has the waves engraved in it.
We won't call them waves of Geneva or cote de Geneve, because they're, from Germany and
they're actually, uh, engraved rather than pressed into it.
The movement itself, you can see it's a huge plate here and, it's called a three-quarter
plate.
Yeah, because it covers most of the movement.
It covers the double barrel movement.
It doesn't cover the balance wheel of course, but you get the chance to really take a look
at that.
And you can see that the way the jewels are mounted, it's a distinctively German way of
mounting them.
That really kind of a, a throwback yesteryear when they used to make German movements in
such a way that the jewels were removable and so that they can be maintained and easily
re-installed.
So they don't need to do that anymore, but they did it as a, uh, tip of the hat to their
history.
Give us a call when we have this watch in stock right now at Swiss watch expo.
And it's a phenomenal value compared to the price of the same, watch new.
So you might check that out on our website and go to SwissWatchExpo, type in Lange 1.
And you'll see what we have in stock, but give us a call.
We might have something in the pipeline that would be interesting to you, clickthe bell
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And give us your comments below what you think about this watch.