Communication 45 Supersonic London Edition
London Calling
A tale of creativity, collaboration and the dream of travel, in a testament to one of the world’s great cities. ANDERSEN Genève's second watch to feature the iconic Concorde on the dial, and its first designed collaboratively with a group of collectors. Cased in platinum, with a cloisonné enamel dial showing Concorde soaring over London's Tower Bridge at dawn, en route to New York. Limited to 20 pieces.
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A handful of London collectors were invited to contribute ideas and to participate in the creative journey
Concorde lifts away from London at dawn, with Tower Bridge below and the Thames winding into the distance. The scene is made by hand in cloisonné enamel on a disc just 18.3mm across: tiny gold wires are bent to draw the outlines, and the cells between are filled with enamel and fired layer by layer. Its straight wires, notoriously hard to keep true in the kiln, make it an exceptional test of skill. The aventurine 24-hour ring glows lighter in its daytime section, thanks to white mother-of-pearl beneath. The city ring is in brown mother-of-pearl, coated on its underside to echo the sunrise. Markings are printed in raised rose gold, with London alone in blue.
Cloisonné is one of enamelling’s oldest and most demanding techniques. For this dial, the enameller bends ultra-thin gold wire by hand to trace each outline: Concorde, Tower Bridge, the London skyline and the curves of the Thames. The wires are set onto a disc just 18.3mm across. The cells between them are filled with enamel paste and fired in the kiln, layer by layer, to build depth and colour. Its straight wires, notoriously hard to keep true in the kiln, make it an exceptional test of skill.
The platinum Communication 45 case, 38mm across and 8.97mm thick, is made at ANDERSEN Genève’s casemaking atelier in La Chaux-de-Fonds. Its curved lugs combine a cornes de vache profile with a teardrop shape, recalling Jean-Pierre Hagmann’s lugs for the 1990 Communication. Each lug is made and polished separately, then hand-soldered to the case. Recessed crowns sit on either side, for setting the time and moving the city ring respectively.
The rotor, in deep blue BlueGold engraved with a wave-form sunray guilloché, carries a micro-carved relief sculpture of Concorde, seen from the front.
