Inside the Baume & Mercier Clifton 1830 Pocket Watch Repeater is an exclusive movement for Baume & Mercier produced by Dubois-Depraz. Well, actually, I don’t think they make the base movement, but they do produce the five minute repeater module, as well as do the fine decoration and skeletonization. While rather simple, the fit and finish on the movement looks fantastic, and the module D73 (from Dubois-Depraz) five-minute repeater sounds great. The bad part is that you never get to see the five minute repeater mechanism working. The system is hidden from view and actually located on the periphery of the movement, versus on it, which would have been nice. I would have been a lot more OK with the very ambitious price of the Baume & Mercier Clifton 1830 Pocket Watch Repeater if there were a glorious view of massive hammers and a long gong coil visible through the sapphire crystal caseback window.

Sure, there is something regal and gentlemanly about carrying a pocket watch around and casually plucking it from your pocket and glancing down to read the time. Then again, most of us have items like that already on us, and they are called mobile phones. One of the major appeals of a wrist watch is that it is visible most all the time, which allows it to be a fashion item as well as a tool. Baume & Mercier include a sort of leather cover/pouch for the pocket watch, but it is still something meant to exist in hiding if you are carrying it. For that reason, I think that most modern pocket watches make better desk or shelf items. They offer more visual spectacle from afar (meaning you don’t need to be right up close to them) and have movements and mechanism which are larger, and thus easier to visually inspect.

I really do like the Baume & Mercier Clifton 1830 Pocket Watch Repeater as a horological collectible and item of beauty. Limited to 30 pieces total, the Baume & Mercier Clifton 1830 Pocket Watch Repeater is, nevertheless, pricey – but it was probably the least expensive pocket watch debuted at the show, coming, again, with a price of $50,000. baume-et-mercier.com