Wind of change 's review on his Vincent Van God

Piotr Winiarski began making watches out of passion, to create pieces very different from what is usually found and to revive vintage movements. He makes many "marriage" models, combining a new open-back case with a restored vintage movement and dials that fulfill his clients' wildest desires. At one point, to acquire new equipment, he launched a Kickstarter campaign offering to create a completely bespoke watch. I find this to be a very good exercise because it allows you to see what you have in mind and how well you can explain it to a Polish artist so that it corresponds to what he is capable of creating. And so that the final result is more or less in line with what you dream of. What populates my imagination isn't Big Ben, nor the chimes of plush drawing rooms, or the opulent wristwatches of organized crime bosses, the horological extravagances of elite athletes, or the financial rewards of social media influencers. No, it's sundials under the sun of the Alps of Haute-Provence, the Alpilles, or the Luberon. It's the pastel colors on the wall and their philosophical motto. It's the powerful sun bringing out the intense colors, like in Van Gogh's paintings in the Arles region. The slow movement of the gnomon's shadow in a trigonometric direction—counterclockwise. It's the hour moving silently across the dial and disappearing with the clouds or the night. This is the local time and the time of day, to which must be added the mean time correction based on the sun's figure-eight curve, and the correction of local time relative to German time, which governs our time, and possibly the adjustment for daylight saving time. So, of course, I have watches that follow this solar rhythm. I have the fantastic Louis Jensol by Jean Louis Moulard, and the inimitable Yes Watch V7 by Bjørn Kartomten. But I dreamed of something less of a "tool watch" and more artistic, where you could almost smell the lavender, hear the cicadas singing, or expect to see butterflies fluttering on thyme blossoms in the hills, lizards scurrying across the rocks, the wind rustling the poppies. In short, something more impressionistic. My brief was precisely that: to evoke the feeling of Provençal sunshine. I initially envisioned a 24-hour movement with a divided dial: the lower half for daytime, perhaps an old olive tree in the hills or a field of sunflowers in bloom under the sun, and the upper half a deep sky with the Milky Way (the Camino de Santiago, as they say). The idea was to separate the day and night zones, using the extreme sunrise and sunset times for the city of Arles, and create an intermediate zone to represent the difference between summer and winter. Then, to simplify the project, we opted for a GMT movement and cut the division at 6-6 o'clock. The idea of the deep sky evolved into a last crescent moon at dawn, a reference to Van Gogh's painting of the starry sky over the city and the cypress trees, removing the depressing city and cypresses and replacing them with daytime suns. Suns reflecting the stars of the night, and sunflowers bathed in light, turning almost poppy red. It was completely wild. I loved it. The GMT hand, representing the sun, traverses this fantastical landscape throughout the day with long rays. To match this sunlit atmosphere, the case is bronze and measures 43mm without the crown. The hands are very legible despite the colorful dial. Overall, it's quite well done. The case back isn't open because it houses a contemporary Japanese movement, not a vintage one, to achieve the GMT function. Instead, a sundial motto, "Carpe lucis horas" (Seize the day), is engraved on the back. The watch comes on a thick leather strap, but I often wear it on a Vario NATO strap when it's warm. It arrives in a practical branded gift box and is packaged in a bag reproducing the Van Gogh painting that inspired the dial. A thoughtful touch for a watch that took much longer than expected to complete. I highly recommend the work of Piotr Winiarski, who creates watches that inspire dreams when you wear them, but especially when you imagine them and discuss each design choice with him. He sometimes launches Kickstarter campaigns. Participate; the result is unlike anything you find in stores. The music I would associate with this watch is "Le soleil" by Elysium. Because this watch truly is a ray of sunshine on your wrist, reminding you of the Provençal sun wherever you are, even in the grayness or the blues. Even in the depths of gloom, in times of failure, when nothing seems to be going right, you can bounce back, rediscover your enthusiasm, and then you'll see the Milky Way under a clear Provençal sky, or the sun illuminating the colors like never before. https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=7ft0gDemaHg