Vianney Halter Antiqua "Halter-Barnes" Earliest Edition Luxury Watch Review

http://www.thewatchbox.com/all-brands The 40mm Vianney Halter Antiqua, born “Halter-Barnes” Antiqua, is the most significant pure design effort of the modern luxury watch era. While others explored new frontiers in complications, the Antiqua perpetual calendar decimated established conventions for the physical form and time displays of an haut-de-gamme watch. When hardcore watch connoisseurs speak of high horology design norms, the 1998 debut of the Halter-Barnes Antiqua is the schism point between “before” and “after.” Without this 18-karat rose gold Halter-Barnes Antiqua, the present golden era of MB&F, Richard Mille, De Bethune, Cabestan, and Harry Winston Opus likely never develops. Jeff Barnes was the designer, and Vianney Halter was the watchmaker. Together, they pioneered the concept of retrofuturism in the watch sector. Rather than strive to design an unabashedly futuristic watch or a nostalgic historic tribute, the team in St.-Croix, Switzerland chose to imagine the future through the critical perspective – the lens – of past futurists. The result looks like something a hypothetical Victorian submariner, airship pilot, or time machine operator might have worn in an alternate universe; “Steampunk” is the word. If Ada Lovelace wore a wristwatch, it would have been the Halter-Barnes Antiqua. Each Antiqua is a tongue-in-cheek love letter to the legacy of H.G. Wells, Jules Verne, and Hugo Gernsback. The imagery of 19th century steam locomotive gauges, ironclad-er