Urwerk

Urwerk was founded in Geneva in 1997 by the watchmaker Felix Baumgartner, working with his brother Thomas, and the designer Martin Frei. Its watches are known for their satellite hour displays, in which numbered hour satellites rotate and travel along a minute track, so the current hour also points to the minutes. The idea draws on a 17th-century night clock made for Pope Alexander VII.

Urwerk's models are named with numbers rather than collection names. The catalog covers the satellite-hour families such as the UR-100, UR-103, UR-105, UR-120 and UR-150; the UR-200 series (UR-210, UR-220 and UR-230) with retrograde minute hands; experimental pieces such as the EMC with its built-in rate measurement, the UR-111C and UR-112 Aggregat with cylinder and prism displays, the reversible UR-T8 and the UR-10 Spacemeter; and the UR-Freak, made with Ulysse Nardin.

Production is very small and almost every model is a limited series, so the exact edition, the case material and the full set matter. Buyers will want a service history from Urwerk, and the satellite mechanism should be checked for smooth, correct operation.