Birthday Presence

We explore the extraordinary models that brought IWC to where it is today.

It’s going to be a big year for IWC. 2018 marks the manufacture’s 150th anniversary and it’s releasing a whopping 28 limited edition models from its Portugieser, Portofino, Pilot’s Watches and Da Vinci families. The limited edition Jubilee Collection will be characterised by white or blue lacquered dials and bear the “150 Years” insignia either as a medallion or as an engraving, but what really ties the models together are the historic models that inspired them.

Perhaps the most striking of these is the Pallweber Pocket Watch. Patented by Austrian watchmaker Josef Pallweber in 1883, these digital display pocket watches were licensed to a number of Swiss watchmakers, but IWC’s iteration remains the most well-known to this day. The IWC Tribute to Pallweber Edition “150 Years” is the first time the design has been presented in a wristwatch, and features a brand new in-house movement, the Calibre 94200, which powers the jumping hours and minutes and runs at 28,800 vph for an impressively long 60 hours. The 45mm rose gold watch is limited to 250 pieces.

If you’re interested in IWC’s own movements, know that the first were made in 1870, two years after Florentine Ariosto Jones founded the brand. These “Jones calibres” pocket watch movements were known for their three-quarter plates, wolf’s tooth winding on the cogs, and elaborate finishing on the plates and bridges.