A. Lange & Söhne Secures Golden Balance For Zeitwerk Date
Good morning. In an attempt to deliver you some news you may have missed without causing you to choke on your cornflakes, I will preface it with this: It is wholly unsurprising. In fact, it is such a common occurrence, that perhaps I should start reporting when A. Lange & Söhne doesn’t win at the Golden Balance awards…
Awards are good. They provide us with some idea of industry direction. That’s never absolute, but they can be useful for ascertaining more what the industry itself wants us to pay attention to (irrespective of what the buying public are voting for with their wallets). Major awards like the Golden Balance are useful to those of us who cannot afford to buy many of the watches that win in categories like this (the over €25,000 segment) as it gives us another angle from which to analyze from afar.
As nuanced as award analysis can be, one thing is clear: A. Lange & Söhne is no stranger to the top step. Winning the Golden Balance award for the remarkable Zeitwerk Date was, while not a forgone conclusion, very much deserved. When Lange released the updated version of its iconic Zeitwerk, the world took notice. While I personally lamented the necessary increase in diameter, the beefed-up brother of everyone’s favorite digital mechanical actually sent very positive waves through the brand’s following. This is the 37th time Lange has won a Golden Balance award since the competition started in 1998. Not a bad annual return by any measure…
A true modern classic
It’s an overused term, but I can’t avoid using here. It is so relevant. The A. Lange & Söhne Zeitwerk Date is a true modern classic. And I don’t just mean it will stand the test of time. Comparing it to other Glashütte legends, this is not the same as a NOMOS Glashütte Tangente, or a Glashütte Original Sixties collection timepiece. Both are classics, but born of a different era and brought up to date for a modern audience. The Zeitwerk (with or without date) is a family for the new age. It is a mechanical interpretation of our digital desires. The addition of the flame-red date indicator, set against a wolf-gray backdrop is a thing of beauty. It deserves all the plaudits it gets and more.
Taking home the Golden Balance award for watches priced over 25,000 euros does not change the legacy of this remarkable piece all that much. But it does give it a little more time in the sun. It reminds us of its brilliance. And it gives us all the chance to bask in the glory of Lange’s exceptional movements. Learn more about Germany’s pride and joy here.
