Swatch's 35th birthday & Limited Club Watch Launch
01-MAR-2018, Geneva, Switzerland
On 01-MAR-2018, Swatch Club had invited the Swiss Club members and the international Gold & Pioneer Club members for a special day in Geneva. It was the 35th birthday of Swatch and also the launch of the limited & numbered 2018 Swatch Club Watch Find Your Way (SUOZ278S). So, Swatch had promised to unveil of two special Swatch watches on that day. In fact, they outdid themselves (again) by launching three special Swatch watches :-)
"Find Your Way" was indeed the (inofficial) motto of the day as most of the 54 participating club members had a very (very) hard time to reach their destination (Geneva City Center) on a snowy thursday morning. For example, we had to drive (only) 250 kilometers. This took us six hours and 30 minutes due to the heavy snow fall, blocked & icy roads as you can see on the photo below (this was in the better part of the trip). Some club members from Germany even never made it to Geneva due to the closure of the airport until 1pm. Denis from UK was rerouted to Zurich(!) so he barely managed to join the farewell drinks in Geneva :-/ But also the Swiss trains were late/delayed (this almost never happens!).
So we arrived two hours late for the event and joined an excited crowd in the Swatch Store Geneva. We had missed the first part (of six or seven parts(!)) of the event, a city hunt through Geneva. As there was about 20cm fresh snow on the street, I was not to unhappy about missing this part of the event.
In the store, the first surprise of the
day was already available: The new special Olympic
Museum New
Gent Quai
D‘Ouchy (SUOZ283)
was available for sale. The watch is packaged in a
nice colourful paper
sleeve and it has the words "Beat Your Own
Record" printed on the back
of the strap. In the future, the
watch will be sold only at the Olympic Museum in
Lausanne.
With the help of several "living dots", the watch was presented by Viktoria Bays (head of Swatch Club International). She explained the concept of the watch and the differences to the regular version of the Club Swatch 2018 Follow The Dots: Here is a comparison picture of the two club watches. You can see that the strap is "inverted" (blue and white is exchanged). The limited version of the club watch (Find Your Way) has colourful dots printed on the inside of the glass while the regular version Follow the Dots has (mostly) blue dots printed on the dial.
On the left: the limited Club watch Find Your Way
(SUOZ278S), on the right: The regular Club watch Follow
The Dots (SUOZ279)
The official presentation photo
Time for a group picture
After the presentation, every event participant had the chance to buy one limited Club special Find Your Way. Only one, no chance to get an extra watch.
Afterwards, Swatch Club invited all Club members for lunch: They had selected the nice restaurant Le Neptune. Fantastic food and a relaxed atmosphere. Highly recommended!
At half past two, we left for the Cité Du Temps for the celebrations of the 35th anniversary of Swatch. Aurélie from Swatch Club was our friendly tour guide :-)
Winter time in Geneva!
...but we are having fun!
So we were invited to the avant-première of NUMBERS, the Swatch latest art exhibition.
This display was formerly shown at the Biennale
2013 in Venice.
At 3pm, we joined a "Talk with Carlo Giordanetti and the artist" (Ugo Nespolo).
Carlo Giordanetti (Creative Director of Swatch) talked about "35 years of Swatch". He told us that Swatch has issued 8372 different Swatch watches in these 35 years. 35 years are 12784 days (including leap years). Hence, a new Swatch watch had been issued every 1.5 days (approx.). That's quite a lot!
Afterwards, he introduced Italian artist Ugo Nespolo to the collectors. Together, they talked about NUMBERS. This is the new art exhibition which is now on display at the Cité Du Temps for the next two months. You can see a few paintings and artworks below. Each artwork is related to a (whole) number or another mathematical formula. Ugo explained his relation to mathematics in great detail. This is a topic that I can deeply relate to :-)
Afterwards, Ugo and Carlo unveiled the new artist special created on the occasion of the 35th anniversary of Swatch: Swatch Ugo (SUOZ281S) is limited and numbered to 3535 pcs and it is packaged in a paper sleeve.
After the vernissage, everyone had the chance to buy one (only one!) Swatch Ugo and Ugo Nespolo patiently signed watches and the (very nice!) exhibition catalogue.
Mission accomplished!
Made of "polyurethane", very flexible! (Carlo himself
allowed me to do this :-)
Souvenir photos!
Here are a few photos from the (highly recommended!) exhibition. Fantastic artworks! And you should try to get the very nice exhibition catalogue with a lot of explanations about the numbers and the artworks.
Indo-Arabic Numerals
10 (Tribute To Pythagoras)
12 (Tribute to Leonardo)
51 [no further explanation necessary I guess]
52 The Tale of Genji
666
1000 (The Thousand Character Classic)
The Golden Ratio
e (Tribute To Euler)
Pi (Tribute to Archimedes and Zu Chongzhi)
At 4pm, it was already time for the closing "aperó". We finally met the last event participant from London. Denis was rerouted to Zurich and only made it to Geneva for a few drinks :-/
