Permeating the recent Salon International de la Haute Horlogerie in Geneva was an undeniable air of conservatism. True, a surfeit of outrageous timepieces kept the Instagram crowd happy, but the trends throughout the watch industry – not just for the 28 brands in Geneva – were for cleaner, smaller timepieces. After two decades of ever-increasing sizes, with 40-44mm being the new norm for men, cases have been dialled back to 38-39mm. From Laurent Ferrier to H. Moser et Cie, Piaget and Panerai and Jaeger-LeCoultre, the place was awash with watches that only told the time.
Sanity had been restored. Or had it? Just when you think it’s safe to go back into the water, up pops MB&F with a diving watch that’s not really suitable for diving, though it’s rated as safe to 50m. The Horological Machine No 7, aka the Aquapod, pays homage to the diving watch concept rather than the need to survive the depths per se. The only analogy I can come up with is the way that designer denims pay homage to the miners of the 1848 gold rush. And yet, somehow I don’t see anyone panning for the stuff wearing a pair of Gucci Jeans.

For starters, the Aquapod contains a tourbillon smack in its centre, and any real diver will tell you that a tourbillon has about as much place in a diver’s watch as a clown’s suit at a funeral. It has twin crowns to manoeuvre the unusual concentric rings that act as hands: rapid legibility is not its forté. But then you see the ‘floating’ blue bezel, and all becomes clear: it is inspired by the rotating bezels that nearly all serious diving watches wear to show elapsed time. From the side, it could be a jellyfish. Or a Smash mashed potato martian. I want one. All 53.8mm of it.
Size, of course, is crucial if you’re making watches to stop people dead in their tracks, downsizing be damned. If MB&F’s offering isn’t wacky enough, then check out the latest expression of Urwerk’s rule-breaking approach to time-telling, which also marks the company’s 20th anniversary. Dubbed the UR-T8, it’s what a Jaeger-LeCoultre Reverso would look like if it was designed by Jules Verne.

How so? Like the Reverso, the case can be flipped over to hide its time-telling side. The case, in natural titanium or black PVD coating, is huge at 60.23×48.35×20.02mm and textured to look like the skin of a glyptodon (look it up). Squeeze two buttons on the side of the case to release it, lift it vertically, rotate it 180° about its axis and click it back into its cradle to hide or expose the time.
Even if it didn’t do its Transformers shtick, UR-T8 would still be cool. If anything, observers might wonder if it’s a watch at all: it could be a FitBit for a heavy-metal guitarist.

It’s too soon to know what will appear at Baselworld this month, but one sneak preview cannot be ignored. Hamilton is always adventurous, and prices are around 100th of those of MB&F
or Urwerk, so ‘wild’n’wonderful’ isn’t the sole preserve of the wealthy. The forthcoming ODC X-03 is the third in a trio of watches, inspired by those Hamilton created for Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Following the X-01 and X-02 of 2006 and 2009 respectively, the ODC X-03 is driven by one automatic and two quartz movements, to provide time in three zones, all in a hefty 49x52mm hexagonal case in titanium with black PVD coating. The dial is printed with an image of Jupiter, and it looks, unsurprisingly, out of this world. But then that’s what it takes
to join this crew.