Vying for 'Watch of the Year'

By William George Shuster -- JCK Online, 3/1/2008 2:00:00 AM

Which timepiece was 2007's watch of the year? A number of brands laid claim at year's end.

German luxury watchmaker A. Lange & Söhne was named by two Austrian publications, the daily newspaper Die Presse and business magazine Format, for its Lange 31 and Grand Saxonia Automatik watches.

Swiss luxury watchmaker Vacheron Constantin won the annual Watch of the Year prize of Swiss watch magazine Montres Passion for its bi-retrograde Patrimony model.

The Vogard F1 was named Watch of the Year by Atempo, Spain's largest watch collectors club. Atempo called Vogard's patented Timezoner “a revolution in world time horology.”

Porsche Design's Worldtimer P'6750, which shows different time zones simultaneously, won the annual iF Product Design Award of Industrie Forum Design, which will be presented at the March 2008 CeBit Information Technology trade fair in Hanover, Germany. Swiss watchmaker Eterna (licensee partner of Porsche Design) designed and built a special movement module, with discs rotating behind the dial. The wearer changes the time zone in the dial's center by pressing a button.