Sarpaneva • Fratellowatches - Opinions on watches, watch reviews, watch stories & industry news

Ace Jewelers

Only Watch 2013

Sarpaneva Korona – Finnish Watchmaking

March 27, 2012 by Fratello 2 Comments

Watchmaking is not limited to Switzerland, or Germany, or Japan. We’ve seen a lot of nice watches coming from other parts in the world as well, like The Netherlands, the UK, Sweden and in this case, Finland. Stepan Sarpaneva was born and raised in Finland, educated by the Finnish School of Watchmaking and flew out to Switzerland for even more horological education followed by work for a number of prestigious watchmakers and manufacturers. Back in Finland, Stepan concentrated on his own timepieces called Korona.

Sarpaneva Korona Finnish Watchmaking

In the recent past, Ming Thein did a hands-on review of Stepan Sarpaneva’s K3 Northern Stars timepiece (click here to read) accompanied by some dazzling photographs of the watch. You don’t see Sarpaneva watches that often, so when the opportunity was there for us we grabbed it and made some photos of Sarpaneva’s creations during BaselWorld 2012.

We were most impressed by the Korona Moonshine watch and the Korona K0 (pictured above) timepieces. Easy and comfortable to wear and you do have the feeling that you are wearing something really exclusive. Wearing a Sarpaneva guarantees interesting conversations with other watch enthusiasts for sure. The Korona Moonshine (pictured below) is a very interesting timepiece with an intriguing dial.

Sarpaneva Korona Finnish Watchmaking

This is probably the biggest moon phase dial available in the market, the aperture to tell the time is only a small part of the dial and it is actually hard to – exactly – tell the actual time. We guess that you are not buying this watch to do so, you have an iPhone for that, right? As you can see, part of the ‘time’-disc is lumed. The luminous part is showing the current position of the moon (moon phase). The Korona Moonshine is the one and only watch available today that presents the moon phase like this.

Sarpaneva Korona Finnish Watchmaking

The Korona case has been used for a few years now, and although it is always a gamble with odd shaped cases, it hasn’t bored us so far. Some times, you’ll see odd shaped cases that are very specific for a certain time or period, the Korona case seems to be a design that could last forever. Like most superb designed products out there. The moonphase’s face on the dial is being crafted out of oxydiced sterling silver or 18K gold.

Sarpaneva Korona Finnish Watchmaking

Like most other watches that Sarpaneva has built, the Korona Moonshine has a modified Soprod A10 calibre movement. The mainplate of this A10 movement has been modified to embed the moonphase complication. As you can see, the rotor has been finished with the famous Sarpaneva unhappy moon face.

This 42mm timepiece is available in stainless steel, gold and in various combinations of finishing and materials.

Sarpaneva Korona Finnish Watchmaking

Another timepiece by the hands of Stepan Sarpaneva is the Korona K0. At first sight, a typical Sarpaneva watch with its Korona case. But wait a minute! It has a diving ring! Unlike many other diving watches who have a rotatable bezel, the Sarpaneva Korona K0 has an inner diving bezel that can be operated with the crown set in the first position. These type of diving rings are not vulnerable for dust, sand and salt water…

Sarpaneva Korona Finnish Watchmaking

Although the diameter of the dial has become a lot smaller because of the diving ring, due to the nice design of the ring it doesn’t feel that way when wearing the watch. The diving ring is part of the dial, perhaps also because it bears the Sarpaneva logo and uses the same colors as the rest of the dial (and movement). Also, since this K0 has a diameter of 46mm, it is all relative of course.

Sarpaneva Korona Finnish Watchmaking

Sarpaneva Korona Finnish Watchmaking

The Korona K0 Diver’s watch comes in a few variations with regards to the dial. We were particularly fond of the blue version above. Like the Moonshine, this K0 also has the modified Soprod movement ticking inside, calibre A10.

More information can be found via the official Sarpaneva website or his Facebook page.

Filed Under: BaselWorld and SIHH Novelties, Sarpaneva

Sarpaneva K3 Northern Stars – Hands On

August 8, 2011 by Ming Thein 2 Comments

Suppose you wanted a watch with a ginormous moonphase display – what would be your choices? Actually not many. And I can’t think of any that have a larger and quirkier moon than the Sarpaneva Northern Stars, introduced at Baselworld 2011. Fully taking up a good 60% of the distance between the hands and the edge of the dial, I’m not sure how much physically larger you can make the moon without resorting to a clock. What’s more, there are actually two moons, the lower of which is framed by vestigial traces of an aperture to indicate its phase.

Sarpaneva K3 Northern Stars Hands On

Sarpaneva K3 Northern Stars Hands On

Sarpaneva K3 Northern Stars Hands On

So where do the eponymous stars come into the picture? Well, the disk holding the moons is solid, but has star-shaped cutouts which are nicely delineated by the polished plates underneath the ‘dial’. In true Sarpaneva style, the watch has no dial per se but a couple of layers of openworked plates which serve as hour indexes, their frames, and the moonphase aperture. The rotating plate carrying the moons itself is the dial.

Sarpaneva K3 Northern Stars Hands On

So far, there are two versions of the Northern Stars available – both in stainless steel; one polished with a blue dial, the other with a matte black DLC case and black dial. The samples I photographed both have rose gold moon inserts, though I also believe there are white gold variants (and gold cases too) – making for a mind-boggling number of color combinations. Good thing they’re limited to 10 pieces per variation.

Sarpaneva K3 Northern Stars Hands On

Sarpaneva K3 Northern Stars Hands On

My personal preference runs to the steel/ blue dial version, as the contrast is better and the moons ‘pop’; but I think the overall design would look more harmonious if the hand and moon materials were to match. The black version also had black hands, which makes it nearly impossible to read – a no-no in my book, given the primary function of any watch is to tell the time!

Sarpaneva K3 Northern Stars Hands On

Sarpaneva K3 Northern Stars Hands On

Movement-wise, the Northern Stars are powered by a modified version of the same Soprod A10 that Sarpaneva has used in his other watches; it also has the attractive signature skeleton rotor (I like to think of it as a manhole cover) and gold oscillating weight. It’s difficult to say if there are any other changes beyond cosmetics (and obviously, the moonphase mechanism which is driven off the former date change train) and finishing without disassembling the watch. This is a good and bad thing, obviously, as a standard movement should be easier to maintain in the long run – but of course lacks the pedigree sought by serious collectors.

Sarpaneva K3 Northern Stars Hands On

Sarpaneva K3 Northern Stars Hands On

I think the Sarpanevas sit in an interesting niche. On one hand, they have very attractive and instantly recognizable design cues. Finishing is excellent, the cases are very well put together and comfortable to wear, ergonomics cannot really be faulted, and there are nice details like multi-layer antireflective coating and the printed logo on the underside of the sapphire. However, I’d personally like something a bit more special under the hood for the money – the Northern Stars occupy a higher pricing tier than say a Jaeger-LeCoultre Grand Reverso GMT – which arguably offers considerably more bang for the buck. For some, though, uniqueness and reliability are a persuasive combination, and in this sense, the Sarpanevas are not a bad deal at all.

Filed Under: Sarpaneva Tagged With: BaselWorld 2011, K3, Moonphase, Northern Stars

Grönefeld GMT06 Tourbillon Minute Repeater is the Wednesday Watch at Motoring Exposure

December 23, 2009 by Robert-Jan Leave a Comment

As an avid reader of the FratelloWatches blog you probably know that I write for some other websites and magazines as well. MotoringExposure.com is one of them, every wednesday they publish the ‘Wednesday Watch’-article. Today, the Wednesday Watch is about the Grönefeld GTM-06 Tourbillon Minute Repeater. I have written this article with a bit of pride, since the Grönefeld brothers are Dutch AND are located in the same area as where I am originally from.

Above you see Bart Grönefeld (right) and myself during the opening of the Grönefeld Exclusive Timepieces Boutique in Oldenzaal. Besides creating their own time pieces, they now have a boutique for other independent watchmakers (McGonigle, Sarpaneva, Kees Engelbarts, Cornelius & Cie) as well.

However, to me, the most special time piece of their boutique is their own GMT06 Tourbillon Minute Repeater. As you can see above, I was even allowed to try it on under heavy supervision. The platinum version (limited to 10 pieces only) has a price tag of 385.000 Euro. Below, you’ll see a close-up of the GTM06 in platinum.

Anyway, for the full article on the Grönefeld GTM06 Tourbillon Minute repeater, click http://www.motoringexposure.com/761/grnefeld-gmt06-wednesday-watch. An article on the opening of their boutique will follow soon.

Filed Under: Grönefeld, Sarpaneva, Watch Talk Tagged With: Independent watchmaking, McGonigle, Minute Repeater, MotoringExposure, Tourbillon

© Copyright 2012 Fratellowatches · All Rights Reserved.