The UR-100 collection has always been very important to Urwerk. They have used it as a way to travel in time and space, showing the versatility of what is in essence a very expressive design. You could call the UR-100V Urwerk’s equivalent to an ordinary round watch, as among all its collections, this is the one that comes the closest.
Granted, the UR-102 Reloaded comes even closer, but that is a re-edition of Urwerk’s very first creation, and although historically significant, this collection is not yet as extensive as that of the UR-100.
Urwerk UR-100V ‘Lightspeed’
With the UR-100, Urwerk explored the past, like with the ‘Time and Culture’ editions, as well as the UR-100V T-Rex, but just as often was it used to explore the future. In that sense, is the new UR-100V ‘Lightspeed’ an extension to this universe, and quite literally, because, as you have probably already guessed by its name, it is all the speed of light as beams shoot through our galaxy.
Doing things differently
It is tempting to say that Urwerk thinks out of the box when it comes to the concept, design, and engineering of its watches; however, Urwerk has never even been in the box. Since their very first model, they have done things differently and only walked on the sound of their own drums. The UR-100V ‘Lightspeed’ has a very unique complication, as it is in a way a sort of planetarium.
While most brands approach this in a more traditional way, and usually show how these heavenly bodies move around the sun, Urwerk came up with something entirely different. It has a unique complication in which it shows the time required for a sunbeam to reach each of the eight planets in our solar system.
When you argue the practical use of this complication, you clearly are not getting the purpose of the UR-100V ‘Lightspeed’. It shows the speed of light in a way, a poetic complication. It makes you think, it makes you realize how vast our own solar system is, and as humankind, we need a serious leap in technology will we ever be able to explore it properly, let alone venture further into the galaxy.
As Felix Baumgarter explains, “We live in a universe governed by three dimensions—time, rotation, and orbit—that we attempt to measure and master, but what escapes us is this notion of SpaceTime.”
Einstein’s theory of general relativity predicted that the space-time around Earth would be not only warped but also twisted by the planet’s rotation. Gravity Probe B showed this to be correct (Image courtesy NASA)
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