It's February 29th And Here's All About Leap Year... And Perpetual Calendars
Every four years is a leap year and the month of February gets an extra day, a leap day, on February 29th. 2020 is a leap year and everything flows smoothly at regular, four-year intervals until 2100, which we discover is not a leap year. Wait a minute, 2100 is divisible by four, so what is going on? Find out why the leap year can be erratic and other intriguing details of how man has struggled to create a rational system that accurately reflects Earth’s rotations around the Sun and “fixed” astronomical events, such as the equinoxes and solstices.Inventing instruments to observe, measure and predict the motions of our universe has consumed astronomers since antiquity. Even if you don't have a telescope or a spectrograph in the spare room, most of us keep track of time with watches and calendars. These surprisingly complex mechanisms condense centuries of astronomic tinkering to account for the discrepancies between our computations and those of the universe. Since 158

Portrait - David Candaux, An Independent Watchmaker with the Soul of the Vallee de Joux
Independent watchmaking has been on the rise over the past 20 years, and for good reason. Independent watchmakers are guided by passion and personal perspectives, leading to authentic creations and often crafted to a level unattainable in mass production. David Candaux's motto, Le Coeur et l'Esprit (the heart and mind), perfectly captures this philosophy. Raised in a family of watchmakers, Candaux deeply appreciates the craft’s history, evident in his work. However, for him, tradition should not merely be repetition. If he is a perfect representative of the Vallee de Joux expertise – which means complicated watchmaking and refined craftsmanship, his watches are in a class of their own. We visited the watchmaker in the small village of Le Solliat Just a few meters away from Philippe Dufour's workshop.Xavier Markl, MONOCHROME – David, thank you for having us. Your approach to watchmaking is holistic, encompassing everything from movement engineering to crafting and fini

Patek Philippe Chronograph 5172G (History, Live Pics, Specs & Price)
Patek – Hand-Wound – Chronograph: three words that give you an immediate indication of what to expect. Classic, iconic, timeless, desirable, historic. This watch, a manual-winding chronograph by Patek, is a perfect example of the grail watch for many collectors. So, you can imagine that when it comes to replacing it, the brand simply cannot afford to make mistakes. And since there’s a new watch in the lineage, it is time to answer the question: what are our impressions of Patek Philippe’s new Hand-Wound Chronograph, the 5172G??BackgroundThe classic, high-end chronograph (without additional complications) is one of the most representative watches of Patek’s savoir-faire, a compendium of the elegance, restrained attitude and timeless look for which the brand is famous. This type of watch feels so familiar that you get the feeling that it has always been represented in Patek’s collections… But you’d be wrong!A steel example of a Patek Philip

Introducing: Swatch x Blancpain Bioceramic Scuba Fifty Fathoms
We knew it was coming… Not only Swatch’s latest collaboration with a higher-end watchmaker from the Swatch Group was teased by the brand, but we even created our own vision of what these Swatch x Blancpain models could have been. And looking at the new Bioceramic Scuba Fifty Fathoms, we were not too far away from reality. Following the Moonswatch and its success, it’s time now for another Swatched-out emblematic watch, but here, there is some good news on the side of the functionalities and mechanics.?The Swatch x Blancpain Bioceramic Scuba Fifty Fathoms next to the inspiration, the classic Blancpain Fifty FathomsDubbed the Swatch x Blancpain Bioceramic Scuba Fifty Fathoms, what we’re looking at here is basically a Swatch take on what is one of the earliest and most respected dive watches, the Blancpain Fifty Fathoms. Born in 1953, this legendary watch has celebrated its 70th anniversary this year with several commemorative models. It isn’t such a surprise

Hands-on with the new Jaeger-LeCoultre Master Compressor Extreme LAB 2 - Photos, Specs and Price - Monochrome Watches
Jaeger-LeCoultre introduced the original Master Compressor Extreme LAB 2 five years ago, during the SIHH 2010. Shortly after this year’s SIHH (Salon International de la Haute Horlogerie) they introduced a slightly redesigned version with blue hints. It is still one of the most technical sports chronographs on the market and it leaves many of the ‘design’ sports chronographs far behind, when it comes to robustness, functionality and practical use. Today we go hands-on with the new?Jaeger-LeCoultre Master Compressor Extreme LAB 2, a proper sports chronograph.What do you expect from a chronograph? That it measures elapsed time? Let’s ask the similar question for dive watches? Do you expect it to sport an abundance of technical features, or will you settle for a uni-directional rotating bezel and the correct depth rating of say 300 meters? When it comes to dive watches it seems that there’s so much more available than just the 300m depth rating and a uni-direc