Ultra Slim Watches an elegant selection of choices.

Many men and Women have become obsessed and sucked into the modern trend for larger wristwatches, we have written before about certain brands staring to move away from the excesses of this fad in recent years, however several brands still continue to produce these larger pieces.

The art of the Ultra Slim watch has for some time been largely ignored, a great pity as it is the ultimate expression of the art of fine wrist watch manufacture, ranked alongside the great achievements such as the tourbillion and the moonphase complications, indeed a watch with merely a hour and a minute hand that is ultra slim or miniaturised is classified as a complication regardless of the fact it has no complications.  And appropriately so, after all in a field where adding more and more extra features at a minature level is the order of the day, what is more complicated than miniaturizing to the greatest slimness?

Presented here is a selection of some of the modern Ultra slim watches, both mechanical and quartz, quartz does not have the same level of recognition as an ultra slim mechanical watch as there is no great art in fitting the already tiny watch into an equally tiny case, however some quartz watches do win points for having particularly attractive cases at the upper end of the watchmaking industry.

 

Frederique constant Index Slim Line Automatic  - £2500 - Produced also in Quartz, this represents amazing value for a high end swiss wristwatch, a true manufacture, Freqerique Constant are very much focused on two things, high quality and good value, even their advertisments state it. Therefore you can find a piece hand made from inception to completion for less than £3000 rather than the 10s of thousands that some of their competitors go for.  As for the watch, at 7mm thick it is not really ULTRA slim, but still represents a good value slim watch that can be worn for many years with pride.

Blancpain Villeret Ultra Slim - £5000 - Although Blancpain love to mention their insception date as 1735, tis is not strictly true, as they dissapeared for some 30 years during the quartz explosion, combined with a output of substandard watches for many years many purists feel they are misrepresenting themselves and therefore lok unfavourably upon the brand.  Ether way they are winning many award with their current range, and this manual wind steel or gold cased beauty is one of their nicest pieces, and coming in with a case diameter of only 33.8mm and a thickness of just 4.5mm, it is a real masterpiece of miniaturization.

Piaget Anti Plano Eccentric Small Seconds - £7000 - Piaget is a brand well known for the excellence of their ultra slim watches, their AntiPlano range was the first to ever incorporate a miniaturized off centre automatic winder within the body of the watch, thereby allowing for greater still feats of slimming and complication, this offering represents the latest from piaget, including an of centre winder, off centre small seconds, and an amazing mere 2.5mm of thickness!  They truly have once again redifined the Ultra  Slim Wrist Watch.

Vacheron Patrimony Extra Plate - £10,000 - Here at Vacheron we see where it all began, they were the first brand to ever invent an Ultra Slim Wrist Watch, and now with the latest iteration of the Extra Plate they have produced (for now) the slimmest mechanical wristwatch in the world.  Very little else needs to be said really, other than this absolute beauty measures in at just 2mm in thickness, with a movement measuring only 1.64mm!!

Jeager Le Coultre Ultra Thin - £7300 - The comparative 'fat boy' of the watches presented here, Jaeger's Ultra thin (rather than slim) measures 6.8mm in thickness, it is fully mechanical and the Jaeger blurb states that it is so special that it need to me made in the same workshops as the toubillon and other specialised movements - well I should hope so too!

Dunhil Wafer Gold - £1900 - Manufatured in Solid Yellow and Rose Gold, this attractive wristwatch is sadly discontinued.  Produced by Alfred Dunhill as pretty much the only significant stand out piece of their previous ranges, ranges which incorporated some pretty nasty abominations.  Its elegant lines and simplicity, along with the extensive use of precious metals, a power reserve on the battery of almost two years, and a case thickness of just 5mm, has meant that some two years after being removed from the range customers still request for the reintroduction of this model, and second hand models still command prices in excess of £1200, remarkable for a dunhill wristwatch from the mid 90s period.

Piaget Classic Polo Collection - £various prices, all solid gold generally £10k and upwards to a ceiling of around £50k - An absolute stand out classic in the world of elegant slim wristwatches, produced only in quartz and in either square or circular, the case design of the Piaget Polo is nothing less than iconic.  A true statement watch and now long discontinued  it was THE solid gold wristwatch to own in the 1980s, the elegant organic shape flowed all the way around the dial to the clasp, and as a terribly clever little touch, the put the winder recessed on the back, so there was no disturbance to the shape of the watch.  The wearer felt like he had an elegant gold bracelet on his wrist that just happened to be able to tell the time.  And being quatz they were able to achieve just a 4.5mm thickness to the watch area, a real beauty, even if it lack the technical brilliance of say the Vacheron Extra Plate.