The Bite Magazine - Autumn/Winter 2021 - Issue 30

Arnold & Son GLOBETROTTER STEEL A Swiss watch brand with a British heart, Arnold & Son takes Jada Brookes’ breath away with its intricately crafted timepieces that can truly be called masterpieces. B orn in Cornwall, England in 1736, Arnold & Son founder John Arnold left for the Nether- lands at the age of 19 after completing his ap- prenticeship with his father to hone his watchmak- ing skills. He returned home two years later fluent in German which placed him in good standing with the court of King George III, from the House of Han- over, to whom he presented a ring with the smallest half-quarter ever made. He also established himself as a watchmaker of repute in London’s Strand by his mid-twenties. Arnold was considered one of the few watchmakers who achieved legendary status by revolutionising his field of study and obtained complete watchmaking proficiency at a time when Great Britain dominat- ed the production of precision timepieces. His most famous timekeeper was the pocket watch no. 1/36 which was sent to the Royal Observatory at Green- wich for a trial and applauded for its precision. His son John Roger Arnold later joined the business and eventually took over from his father. Four years before his father officially retired, John Roger was sent to Paris in 1792 to study with the great French watchmaker Abraham Louis Breguet, a friend of John Arnold, after his apprenticeship at his father’s facility. In 1808, Breguet presented his first tourbillon escapement, mounted in one of Arnold’s pocket chronometers. Other milestone achieve- ments included Arnold’s chronometer no. 2109 trav- elling with Rear-Admiral Sir William Edward Parry on his voyage towards the North Pole in 1820. The following year, John Roger was granted a patent for his U-shaped balance and became a predomi- nant supplier to the Admiralty. Out of 129 chronom- eters belonging to the Royal Navy, no fewer than 84 were signed by John Roger, his father or Arnold & Son. After he died in 1843, the watch brand contin- ued under Charles Frodsham, a renowned English watchmaker, until the mid-19th century. In 1857, Arnold & Dent’s no. 4575 chronometer accompa- nied David Livingston on his expedition to South Africa. Today, based in La Chaux-de-Fonds in the Swiss Jura region, Arnold & Son, relaunched in 1995, em- bodies modern watchmaking encased in a tradition- al exterior. The brand eschews commonly expected conventions to create singular collec- tions imbued with English heritage, thus uniting the authentic standards of Swiss watchmaking with a unique aesthetic. It continuously pays homage to the work of its founder, who pro- vided solutions to the challenges of his era, notably the accuracy and reliability of timepieces. John Arnold produced some of the most accurate marine chronometers of the 18th century and won several awards from the Bureau des Longitudes. He filed several patents, including one for a compensa- tion balance featuring a bimetallic balance-spiral in 1775 and another for a helical balance spring with terminal curves in 1782. He also produced simpli- fied chronometer design principles that permitted mass production of these timepieces, including many reserved for His Majesty’s Royal Navy. It is said that he contributed to the modern defini- tion of the term ‘chronometer’ which today refers to a high-precision timepiece driven by a movement that has passed an accuracy inspection carried out by an official neutral body. Further achievements in- clude true seconds (or dead-beat seconds), a func- tion that recalls the escapement of pendulum clocks marking the seconds and dual time zones driven by twin regulating organs that hark back to the original method of maritime positioning. The amazing moon-phase displays illustrate the brand’s mastery of the classic while revealing a more unconventional side through the use of a large moon in sculpted gold. With power reserves of up to eight days, this pays homage to marine chronometers that also benefitted from impressive autonomy. The twenty or so calibres presented to date by Arnold & Son have all been conceived, designed, developed, machined, decorated, assembled and adjusted by its sister Manufacture, La Joux-Perret. There is something perpetually fascinating about an Arnold & Son timepiece thanks to the three-di- mensional architecture of its movements, the late 18th-century style cantilever balance-cocks, the George V-style bridges, the constant quest for multi- axial symmetry and the artfully crafted guilloché di- als. Intriguing pieces include the Luna Magna with bitewatches