Why We Love It
Say it with us, gold watches are cool. You know whats cooler than a gold watch? A gold chronograph. Chronographs are one of the most basic kinds of tool watches, and gold is a material that is decidedly not for the everyman. What happens when you combine the two? A category that is seldom seen today: The Dress Chronograph. That is exactly what we have here. 34mm, dual register layout with a beautiful eggshell dial offset by gold dauphine hands and a touch of blue steel. Telephone Dial built into the 3 o'clock position and elegant gold applied hour markers, and a slim manual wind movement. There's so much to love, I'll stop myself before I begin to ramble.
The Story
Universal Genéve has become synonymous with chronographs. In the last decade, the demand for their vintage models has risen sharply, with some examples making world record appearances on the auction circuits. Surely, Universal Genève is a staple of vintage collecting.
The 1940s to the 1960s were in many ways the golden years of chronograph production for Universal Genève. The timepieces produced during this period (in particular the "" Compax and the "" Tri-Compax) have attracted the attention and admiration of collectors. So in the 1990s, when Universal Genève wanted to commemorate its centennial, a chronograph espousing similar design language seemed a natural choice.
Already a stunning sports watch, the original Panda Dial Compax of the 1960s was catapulted into the collector's periphery after it became closely associated with famous model Nina Rindt, née Lincoln, who married the legendary Formula One driver Jochen Rindt in 1967. We're certain that this version of the Compax would have become a classic with or without Nina Rindt, due to its brilliant design and similarities to the Omega Speedmaster, Roled Daytona, and Heuer Carrera, but when the ever-stylish Nina Rindt put her white-and-black Compax on a leather Bundeswehr strap and wore it to one of Jochen's races, she unknowingly created a juggernaut that still has collectors hungry for more.
