Even in the wild and fantasy world of Haute Horlogerie, few brands are as dedicated as Urwerk to bring a futuristic look to modern mechanical timepieces. Since the establishment of the brand in 1997, this creative, sci-fi style design concept has brought rich returns, but the task of creating future aesthetics is accompanied by the responsibility of constantly creating new ideas. Urwerk’s latest new design subverts and expands its calling card satellite hour concept, creating a unique hunter shell design that makes you feel as comfortable as on earth on Yavin 4 or Arrakis. The new limited edition Urwerk UR-112 Aggregat offers one of the brand’s boldest visions of the future so far and creates some truly fascinating new watch concepts.
The Urwerk UR-112 Aggregat’s titanium case is 42 mm wide, 51 mm long, and 16 mm thick. It is completely different from the typical case design, even according to the brand’s own compromise standards. The slanted, wedge-shaped, and fuzzy rectangular form is full of unorthodox gorgeous and interesting details, and Urwerk decided to render the matte sandblasted form in black and warm graphite gray to help highlight these complexities in the image. Viewed from above, the main focus of the case is its strongly convex central ridge and the black hinge part with sharp groove texture.
Although it is far from the usual classic style background, technically speaking, this introductory part is the hunter’s bottom cover. Press the two buttons at 3 o’clock and 9 o’clock on the lower case, the lid will open, and a pair of square sapphire display windows show the movement, the seconds subdial and the power reserve indicator.
This is a very original move that can simplify the appearance of the case in a conventional position and add a lot of visual effects to the wrist. The T-shaped lugs create a sci-fi lightness in the initial image for this huge geometric case, while the folding D-ring crown is half-recessed in the case at 3 o’clock. A pair of cylindrical sapphire crystals at 6 o’clock show futuristic timing elements in the initial image, and the soft curves on the back of the case should help this watch to wrap comfortably around the wrist.
Although this out-of-the-box multi-component shell structure is visually compelling, Urwerk’s ability to maintain athletic performance in this unorthodox way is also worth mentioning. The brand rated the UR-112 Aggregat as a durable 100-meter water resistance.
Urwerk UR-112 Aggregat has no dial in the traditional sense. Instead, the main timing function is handled in a double barrel sapphire crystal at 6 o’clock. Urwerk has adjusted its familiar satellite hour complication and developed it to a new level of complexity. The hours and minutes are marked by a set of rotating notched black triangular prisms on the planetary gear system. For the minute display, each prism is gradually replaced by the next within five minutes. The eye-catching white lumen scale and the corresponding arrow allow the wearer to determine the exact minute currently displayed with Arabic numerals.
In contrast, the hour display is clearer and easier to see at a glance. Only a directional line and arrow are needed to deal with it. The current hour can be intuitively clear in the static image, but Urwerk ensures that it is easy to read at any time during the hour, thanks to an additional mechanical function-the time-jumping mechanism. The overall presentation is clean, high-contrast, and practical, which helps to alleviate the confusion of reading these alternative subdials, but has ultra-modern features that are radical enough to avoid feeling bored in the image. The subdial of the seconds hand hidden under the cover of the Hunter-style hinged case uses the same eye-catching twist on the standard seconds hand. The moving Arabic numerals etched on the silicon wafer enter the strongly brushed and anodized red display window.
This keeps the digital timing theme of the rest of the design intact in the image. In order to make these tiny moving figures clear and easy to read, the entire crystal on the top of this small dial is like a magnifying glass. Compared with other designs, the power reserve sub-dial is more traditional, with a simple retrograde pointer on the scale of a similar instrument. This multi-aperture layout may be confusing for some people, and it is undoubtedly complicated, but in the original image, it effectively promoted the design concept of the previous Urwerk model.
Urwerk UR-112 Aggregat’s internal proprietary UR-13.01 automatic movement is as left-field and imaginative as the rest of the design, but the basic performance figures may obscure this. Although on paper, a 48-hour power reserve of 28,800 bph may sound substandard in this ultra-luxury segment, but in order to appreciate the work Urwerk has done with this movement, we need to consider the design layout. This is far from the traditional gear train, and in some respects the commonality with the automobile transmission system is more similar than the typical mechanical watch movement.
In order to facilitate the display of unusual shapes and planetary gear displays, a single main barrel is connected to the hour and minute display via a car-style vertical drive shaft, with a differential at the end. Another consideration for this unorthodox system is torque-basically every design choice here, from the shifted hour and minute display, to the heavy rotating prism, and the fast-moving silicon seconds dial, consumes more power. The requirements for machinery are higher. The movement is better than the traditional three-handed layout. In order to retain every drop of energy from a single mainspring, Urwerk turned to another modern car technology-the kinetic energy recovery and regeneration system.
In short, Urwerk uses the complex movement of the satellite minute display to advance the sharp and high-torque jumping action of the hour prism by storing some of the force accumulated in the past hour in the planetary gear train and releasing it when it explodes. Hour display. Although most of the content of the movement itself is hidden outside a set of glass plates, the concept behind the UR-13.01 movement brings its own visual drama. Urwerk created a rugged and simple tapered black textile strap for UR-112 Aggregat, retaining the toughness and sportiness of the design, while placing the focus directly on the case in the initial image.
Although the extraordinary design decisions behind the limited edition Urwerk UR-112 Aggregat will not appeal to all tastes, the pure creativity, mechanical strength and futuristic thinking behind this new design effectively evoke a new generation of avant-garde creative philosophy of the brand. copy watches