In its Architects of Time series, revived brand Cauny recently released a modern take on Bauhaus minimalism by Spanish architect Rafael Moneo.
Known for sleek Sixties watches within the collectors' sphere, Portugal-based brand Cauny has signed up an impressive roster of architects for their series devoted to architects, with Alvaro Siza Vieira designing the first edition. We can expect further designs from Portuguese and Japanese Pritzker award winners.
On his inspiration, Spanish architect Moneo tells us: 'When Cauny asked me to design a watch, I couldn’t help but think of the two occasions on which I had designed clocks: for the Logroño City Hall and the Atocha Station. In both cases, the clock alludes to the meaning of the hours associated with the day's passing: twelve o’clock — noon — as the day's summit. The hours related to daily activity, distinguishing between morning and afternoon. Not as a succession of moments, something that happens with the beat of digital clocks.'
The result is a spare, distilled essence of watchmaking set in a gloss black square. There are also two versions in steel with white dials and a dressy gold PVD version, but the purity of the all-black version with its architectural shape is refreshingly different. At only 30x30mm, the size is Cartier-perfect with a darker vibe. On designing on such a small scale, Moneo says: 'Going from designing a clock on a building to the design of a wristwatch has been a complete surprise. Working with millimeters and tenths of a millimeter, accustomed to thinking in terms of centimeters and meters, has been a disciplined exercise to which the presence of the texture of the materials was not alien, always making itself felt on our wrist.'
The Cauny watches all come on soft Horween straps, which are supple and have a soft matte contrast to the formality of the case design. Any square watch will wear larger than its round counterpart, and a 30mm square is dainty in a good way, while the white dials appear slightly larger. There is something right about the utter crispness of the stark black square with its elegant thin Roman numerals; meanwhile, baton hands are graceful when matched against the scale and thickness of the clean white details. In other versions, honey-colored leather with gold and black would make a suave watch for suiting up.
