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Event Horizon: The Inexorable Pull of Panerai
Join us for the full monty treatment on the phenomenon known as Officine Panerai and an in-depth look at their three new calibres.
Panerai's In-House Heritage
Unless you are hopelessly in the thrall of DOTA or rehearsing Ozzy Osbourne impressions for the great Black Sabbath show, you will have heard of Officine Panerai's three new calibres unveiled to great fanfare at the Salon International de la Haute Horlogerie in April. For the Paneristi, this was the Event Horizon — the outer edge of an irresistible force that may be safely approached, sort of, but absorbs all that enter.
Allow us to tarry with this metaphor for a little while because, honestly, we were a bit perplexed ourselves when Panerai first announced that they intended to go the way of the true Manufacture. When the P.2002 debuted last year (in a limited-edition series of 250 watches), we were suitably impressed but still in a bit of daze over this development. We shall have more to say about the technical aspects in a moment but for now, we return to physics.
The only explanation we can come up with, reasonably, for Panerai's Manufacture aspiration relates perfectly to the concept of the Event Horizon. For years now, Panerai watches have seen an explosion of demand. This is obvious to just about everyone and all their uncles (and all their uncles' casual acquaintances). Those who took the plunge and bought themselves a piece found themselves hopelessly in love. Those who circled cautiously never understood. Officine Panerai has been drawing all this love in, going from strength to strength — just as a black hole does as it draws more mass to itself.
Here the comparison to the Event Horizon ends because Panerai is giving as good as it got. Panerai invested the trust and the passion of the Paneristi and other supporters in the development of its in-house movements because no other reward would have been good enough. We'll get to the rewards in due course but first, a short story of how and why it came to be.
Officine Panerai
Just over a decade ago, the luxury consortium Vendôme, the precursor to what we now know as Richemont, acquired the burgeoning Italian instrument watch brand Officine Panerai. The division of Panerai that was included in this deal was responsible for the design and creation of compasses, depth gauges and precision optical instruments, in addition to the mechanical watches that were gaining a worldwide cult following.
These undersea navigational instruments had been part of the brand's portfolio since the early part of the 20th century, and especially during the Great Wars. The Italian Navy was a major customer of the brand, who appreciated the brand's values and thus commissioned a number of precision devices. Of these, the watches created for the Navy's commando divers were what would come to define the marque. They were offered for public sale from 1993, when Panerai first sold timepieces to civilians. These once-special and secret military watches came in both Luminor and in Mare Nostrum styles.
Both the Luminor and Mare Nostrum were distinctly Panerai. They both followed in the tradition of having an extremely legible, minimalist dial readout housed in a sturdy steel case, whose shape, in the case of the Luminor, had changed minimally since 1936 when it was first revealed to Italian Naval officers.
The iconic Luminor actually started life as the Radiomir. In the 1930s, Panerai had the innovative idea to use the radium-based substance "Radiomir" in the dials of their specially-commissioned divers' watches, for use deep below the sea's surface. Behind the unbranded black dial was a mechanical watch movement supplied by Rolex, but made from an ébauche by Cortébert. Other companies such as Angelus were also responsible for supplying Panerai with watch mechanicals for integration into their timepieces. In fact, Panerai bought in these Swiss-made ébauche movements, suitably and carefully modified for use in their watches, all the way until recently.
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