Poetry in motion
Why do we love mechanical watches? Perhaps because they feel ‘alive’ like few other machines, an intricate collection of wheels and pinions, barrels and springs all whirring eagerly away with one express mission: to accurately tell the time. But most alive of all are open balance designs, which put the crucial regulating organ front and centre.
Christopher Ward's first free-sprung balance wheel watch, The C12 Loco, is the most ambitious piece we’ve ever created, demanding not just top-notch design and detailing, but also a brand-new in-house movement, to make it possible.
Feller Pivotages SA, a specialist hairspring and escapement developer, was drafted in to handle some of the more hair-tearing challenges, like creating our own, entirely unique balance wheel. Meanwhile, the movement behind it reimagines, well, everything, thanks to fresh architecture and a new energy flow.
Beautifully symmetrical, and dedicated to celebrating the new CW-003 movement’s most important elements, this is not just our most elegant sports watch ever, but also our most highly detailed, with brushed finishes, punchy colour contrasts, and multiple bridges demanding a myriad of hand-polished facets.
It’s no wallflower either, coming in a striking range of shades: vertically-brushed black or smooth opaline white each bring a crisp, classic sensibility, but for a more striking look, why not try such ‘supercar shades’ as vibrant Pasadena Blue or heart-stopping Frisco Orange? Both are brand-new colours created especially for this watch – and took a half-dozen iterations until we found shades that were exactly right.
Slick, highly technical, supremely well-considered and innovative across the board, The C12 Loco is Christopher Ward at its most modern, most exciting, and most unexpected: a glittering, ever-moving, none-more-alive landmark watch to appeal to the child in each of us, yes, but to the technocrat too. As elite-level haute-horology made accessible to all, it’s one of the most explicit iterations of the Christopher Ward mission to date.
You’d have to be loco to attempt it; luckily, that’s exactly what we are…
Introducing Calibre CW-003
Designed to achieve the most symmetrical layout possible, the new, manually-wound CW-003 movement is unique to this watch and hand-finished to a superb degree. Built of no fewer than 138 individual components, The C12 Loco will stay running accurately for an incredible 144-hours (or six days) after winding, and with a timing tolerance of -0/+7 seconds per day.
Architecture and artistry
For all its intricate, whirring elegance, you never for one moment forget that The C12 Loco is a sports watch, with everything that implies: technical ability; a crisp, clean contemporary confidence. It’s nothing less than the spiritual child of Louis Cartier and Le Corbusier working in unlikely but delightful harmony…
Dialled up
The C12 Loco’s dial is a thing of beauty, with three vertically stacked circles from twelve to six, held by strong horizontal lines: bridges supporting the floating balance, small toothed escapement, and a just-off-centre step to accommodate the time-telling dial. There’s depth and detail everywhere—from visible gears in the trench beneath the hands to the ‘ski-jump’ drop-off, above which a vertical brushed finish contrasts with the lightly grained grené surface below. The white has different hands and grené throughout.
Your beating heart
The C12 Loco’s brand new, custom-designed, free-sprung balance wheel and particularly fine 0.045mm hairspring (that’s less than the width of most human hairs) constantly oscillate before your eyes. Regulated by tiny screws (replacing traditional pins for extra precision), it oscillates at a frequency of 4Hz, which amounts to 28,800 vibrations (or beats) per hour.
The big finish
From the large and incredibly clear time-telling dial at 12 o’clock – featuring generous amounts of lume on both hands and markers for maximum legibility – to the intricate, ever-moving floating balance just below it, The C12 Loco is a feast of just-so facets and endless delicate hand-polishing, creating a watch with such considered visual depth it’s a delight from every angle, (Hey, there’s over five hours of hand-finishing on the bridges alone.)
Case study
The C12 Loco takes Christopher Ward’s Twelve case and re-invents it, with a redesigned mid-case and a steeper downturn from case into bracelet, helping the watch contour more closely to the natural curve of the wrist. Best of all, you can see right into the heart of the watch through a gorgeous 3.35mm high glass box sapphire crystal at the front, and another to the rear.
Charm bracelet
Think ‘integrated bracelet sports watch’ and you think, of course, of finely-finished metal bands – and have we got a doozy for you. The much-admired Twelve bracelet is presented here in a new slimmed-down form which, with its 16mm taper, wears beautifully and suits the watch to a tee.
Strap battle
The C12 Loco’s rubber FKM straps come with our Bader Buckle and offer a striking alternative look, in a range of colours to match or – dramatic! – contrast with your dial. There’s no bad combination here, quite frankly, and the joy of Christopher Ward’s quick release technology making switching between them a breeze, why wouldn’t you consider buying a handful…?
A revolution in motion
The C12 Loco is Christopher Ward’s most ambitious watch to date – featuring a new in-house movement, the company’s highest-ever levels of finishing, and a dial design the watch world’s going to go mad for.
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