Continuing on its journey to develop and utilize new variations of ceramic, IWC has just announced its Ceralume luminous ceramic technology and, along with it, the brand’s first fully glow-in-the-dark ceramic watch. This project was brought to life by IWC’s engineering division XPL, reporting that, “The technology enables IWC to produce fully luminous ceramic watch cases for the first time.” In practice, this could be interesting because it promises to combine the extremely high scratch resistance of ceramic with what we expect to be a fun luminous effect.
In 1986, IWC debuted the first ceramic-cased watch with the Da Vinci Perpetual Calendar Chronograph — a quirky, ’80s-looking watch that combined old-school dial and case designs with the cutting-edge modernity of ceramic. Arguably more fascinating than it is beautiful, the first ceramic IWC is a bit like an ’80s concept car: You can precisely date it at a quick glance, and yet, it could have premiered yesterday. Since then, IWC has created a wide range of fully or partially ceramic-clad watches and developed other alternatives such as the ceramized titanium Ceratanium.
According to IWC, Ceralume is produced by homogeneously mixing ceramic powders with high-grade Super-LumiNova pigments — likely the same pigments that go into the paint that are then used to fill up the hands and markers on a dial. The brand claims that, “In dark chamber tests, a fully luminous concept watch manufactured using the Ceralume technology has emitted a bright blueish light for more than 24 hours.” IWC worked with Swiss technology company RC Tritec to figure out a ceramic compound whose structure worked with the glow-in-the-dark pigments.
To get properly geeky, it’s worth noting how conventional white ceramic is made. Zirconium oxide is mixed with other metallic oxides, and the resulting powder is shaped into a so-called green body that is machined close to the final case geometry and then sintered at high temperatures in a kiln. Now, for the white ceramic to glow in the dark, Super-LumiNova pigments are added to the mix of raw materials. According to IWC, “One of the main challenges in the development of IWC Ceralume was achieving a perfectly homogenous mix of raw materials despite their different particle sizes and avoiding particle accumulations. To achieve this, IWC’s engineers reverted to a dedicated ball milling process, which had to be customized for the raw materials used.” If all that wasn’t enough, the parameters of the sintering process and the grinding of the sintered ceramic body also needed to be specifically adapted for luminous ceramic.
The first watch to be fitted with a Ceralume glow-in-the-dark ceramic case is the IWC Pilot’s Watch Chronograph 41 Ceralume with a white luminescent dial (what else, right?), and a white luminescent rubber strap enriched with Super-LumiNova pigments. If UV-lit parties were still a thing, this watch would certainly be the star of the night. Suppose you wanted one of these not necessarily utilitarian but arguably fun pieces: We have bad news for you. Sadly, there is no Ceralume IWC watch that you can buy at this time, only a claim from the brand that, “The patent-pending Ceralume technology will form the foundation of future developments and releases.” We will cover this prototype IWC Pilot’s Watch Chronograph 41 Ceralume watch and subsequent production pieces in due time. Until then, you can learn more at the brand’s website.