Specialists have begun the restoration of the Edinburgh Time Ball, one of the Scottish capital’s best known horological attractions, which hasn’t been operating since 2020. A time ball is a signaling device, a sphere that drops down a pole at a predetermined time — the best known now may be the New Year’s Eve ball…
David Dorward was a young boy when he first visited the Floral Clock, a combination of horology and horticulture initially installed in 1903 on a south-facing slope of the West Princes Street Garden in Edinburgh’s New Town area. “I remember when I was a child,” he said, “my mum and dad would bring me down…
Oyvind Von Doren Asbjornsen wasn’t content with slapping a rook or a bishop on a watch and calling it a chess-themed timepiece. A watchmaker who also is an avid player, he wanted a sophisticated design, yet one that resonated with aficionados of the game. So in 2019, his brand, Von Doren, based in Oslo, released…
The dreaded bumps can occur anywhere you shave, wax or pluck. Here’s how to avoid them.
At the award ceremony for the Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève last November, one winner provoked a few double takes. The victor among six finalists in the annual design competition’s Challenge category which, last year, focused on watches priced at 2,000 Swiss francs, ($2,203) or less, was the Millesime Automatic Small Seconds, a 39.5-millimeter vintage-inspired…
The commissioning of architects to design watches has been a thing at least since the 1950s. In more recent times, some brands have asked winners of architecture’s highest honor, the Pritzker Prize, to design a timepiece. Thus far 10 of the 53 recipients of the award, given annually since 1979, have taken a horological detour…
Time may be divided into past, present and future, but for the independent Swiss watchmaker Ludovic Ballouard, the only time that counts is the present. It’s a philosophy he developed the hard way, through personal suffering and loss. Watching his wife, Eveline, endure cancer for 10 years took a toll. “I realized you have to…
Produced by Antonio de Luca Micro Macro is an interactive quiz by Kimberly Arcand, an astronomy-visualization scientist for NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory at the Harvard and Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. Dr. Arcand is an author of “Magnitude: The Scale of the Universe.” Images by Mohit Lalwani, CC BY-SA 4.0, NASA/GSFC, Alan Friedman, 22Kartika CC BY-SA…
Any outdoor space in the city, no matter how small, is a precious thing. “In New York City, if you’re fortunate enough to actually have a terrace or a patio, you’re one of the lucky few,” said Keita Turner, an interior designer based in Manhattan. “Anytime you have something like that, it should be an…
As Dr. Sreyleak Luch drove to work the morning of Feb. 8, through busy sunbaked streets in Cambodia’s Mekong river delta, she played the overnight voice messages from her team. The condition of a 9-year-old boy she had been caring for had deteriorated sharply, and he had been intubated, one doctor reported. What, she wondered,…