BY HARLAN CHAPMAN-GREEN
Have you ever wondered what it would look like if you combined Ulysse Nardin’s iconic Freak watch with the weird and wonderful wandering hour watches from Urwerk? Well, wonder no more, as at Dubai Watch Week, these two brands unveiled their first collaboration piece, dubbed the Urwerk x Ulysse Nardin UR-FREAK.
The first thing you need to know is that these two brands have worked together masterfully; it’s surprising how natural this new design fits in either of their collections. Ulysse Nardin’s self-winding calibre UN-241 was the starting point upon which 150 brand new components were made to fit Urwerk’s iconic wandering hours display. The carousel rotates once every three hours. At the tip of each arm is an arrow pointing to the minutes track displayed around the 3 o’clock side. Within each arm is the hour number displayed on its own rotating disk; thus, if the number in the arm were seven and the arm was pointing at 15 on the scale, you would know it is 7:15. At the centre of the dial is a silicon escapement beating at 3Hz with a surprisingly long power reserve of 90 hours.
All of this is placed within a futuristic-looking sandblasted titanium case measuring 44mm x 12mm. In the true style of Ulysse Nardin’s most iconic collection, the case of the UR-FREAK has no winding crown, with the winding and time setting being performed by interacting with the caseback. This is perhaps why, despite the sporty appearance and fluorescent rubber strap, the UR-FREAK’s case is only water resistant to 30 meters.
The UR-FREAK is available now for CHF 100,000 and is limited to just 100 pieces. Being made by such popular independent brands, I would expect these to sell very quickly.
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