Not all images were able to load for printing. Please close the print window and try again. Introducing Pascal Brandt, Denis Peshkov and the result of our Habring2 x MONO Charity Auction
...and there's more... videos and why we hardly cover vintage!
Last month Phillips auctioned a unique Doppelchrono a.k.a. Split Second Chronograph a.k.a. Rattrapante. It was the watch that Maria and Richard Habring² and we, at MONOCHROME, together donated to the Save the Children charity organisation. And there’s more news, as we have two new team members whom I want to introduce!
But first, that stunning and unique Salmon Doppel 38 Habring² x MONOCHROME that was auctioned last month. The result is that I wired 25,000 CHF (the entire proceeds of this auction) to the Save the Children organisation’s bank account yesterday. Phillips, in association with Bacs & Russo, generously offered to auction this ‘lot’ free of charge, so the full proceeds could be donated to Save the Children. Of course, I’d love to thank Maria and Richard Habring for their incredibly generous donation and Phillips for auctioning our watch free of charge. But most importantly, I’d love to thank the person who bought this lovely salmon-dial Doppel 38 with its striking “Montre de Souscription” dial; thanks, and I hope you will enjoy wearing your new watch!
I usually do not introduce new team members, but today I’m making an exception… and rightfully so! Pascal Brandt, an industry veteran, and Denis Peshkov have joined MONOCHROME. You might have spotted Denis’ articles already on the website. Denis Peshkov has been submerged in the world of watches for a long time. He was the editor and publisher of the Russian edition of Revolution magazine for over 12 years. Over time, Denis also contributed to several major local media outlets, but last year, he decided to go international and join MONOCHROME. Denis favours classical designs but recognizes well-conceived extravagant timepieces, loves chronographs, and is an ardent supporter of independent watchmaking; yes, a good fit for us at MONOCHROME!
Pascal Brandt… well, I think to most of our readers, his name might not ring a bell. However, for people working in the watch industry, Pascal Brandt is a well-known name, an institution, you could say. Pascal Brandt worked as a freelance journalist for ten years, for several Swiss and foreign media, like the Journal de Genève, Europa Star, Le Temps and L’Hebdo/Montres Passion before he moved to the brand side of things. He joined Officine Panerai in Milan in 2001, then Vacheron Constantin in 2003 as Communications and Press relations officer before he joined Bulgari Watch Division in 2009 and in 2022, he joined Parmigiani Fleurier. For MONOCHROME and thus for you, our readers, Pascal brings a wealth of knowledge, contacts and inside information. Later today, we will publish his first story for us, an interview with Mr Francois-Paul Journe.
And now for something completely different! You might have read about the scandal around an Omega Speedmaster ref. 2915-1 that sold at auction for more than $3 million.
The watch is what’s called a Frankenwatch; an original Omega Speedmaster with “other” original Omega parts and some fiddling to the watch to create the ultimate collector’s dream-looks for a vintage Speedy. We didn’t cover the auction nor the record price that the watch fetched. Nor did we cover when the news broke about this fraud. This case is the perfect example why we, at MONOCHROME, stay away from vintage auctions. But hey, we do cover auctions, but mainly auctions of nice Independents!
Have you checked out our YouTube channel lately? We have been increasing the number of videos over the last years, and we keep increasing this. We also gather all our videos here on the website. Since creating videos is a sh*tload of work, I’m super happy to tell you that Brice Goulard (our managing editor) and Robin Nooij (who manages the socials) have started to present some of our videos.
I hope you will enjoy our videos, presented by Brice, Robin or myself. And I also hope you enjoy the articles written by Denis Peshkov and Pascal Brandt.
Thanks for reading MONOCHROME!
