Celebrating
CRAFTSMANSHIP
Bespoke suits rubbed shoulders with antique timepieces at Huntsman’s Savile Row home on Monday night, at a dinner hosted by Huntsman and Sotheby’s.
Bespoke suits rubbed shoulders with antique timepieces at Huntsman’s Savile Row home on Monday night, at a dinner hosted by Huntsman and Sotheby’s chairman Harry Dalmeny to mark the auction house’s sale of rare English watches, called “Celebration of the English Watch Part II: John Harrison’s Enduring Discovery.” (Harrison was an 18th Century watchmaker, who had devised a way of measuring longitude while at sea, and whose work went on to be highly influential in watchmaking.)
The auction, which takes place July 7, spotlights watches that span 500 years of British history, such as a Thomas Howes silver pocket watch that dates from around 1635, and a George Goodman gold watch that’s etched with an enamel portrait of poet Alexander Pope, made in 1779.
A number of watches that are part of the auction were on display during the dinner, with Daryn Schnipper, Senior Vice president and Chairman of Sotheby’s International Watch Division and Benoît Colson, Associate Specialist for watches at Sotheby’s, both on hand to explain the watches’ significance.
Guests sat down to dinner at a table in the club room of the Savile Row tailor’s, amid select pieces from Huntsman’s archive and current collections. On display was a mink coat made by Huntsman in the 1927, along with the house’s hero piece for Autumn 2016, its Machir tweed sports coat. And guests also got a preview of Huntsman’s collaboration with men’s style magazine The Rake, which has resulted in an “urban tweed jacket,” made in a bespoke navy tweed by the Islay Woollen Mill.
Among the guests were Wei Koh, founder of The Rake and watch magazine Revolution, Huntsman’s Chairman Pierre Lagrange, and the house’s CEO Philippe Brenninkmeijer. With pocket watches – and some more modern timepieces from Sotheby’s upcoming Important Watches auction in Geneva in November – as centrepieces on the tables, guests dined on slow cooked beef fillet with baby spinach, with a salted caramel torte for pudding.
As for wines, guests sipped Ruinart Blanc de Blancs, Chablis 1er Cru Les Fourneaux, and Chateau Le Crock Saint-Estephe.
The supper went on until past midnight, with guests taking the opportunity to show off their own watches, too. The party was particularly enchanted with one guest’s Bremont watch, which was made with parts from a World War II Spitfire jet, which had shot down five enemy planes during the Battle of Britain.