Planetarium

A specialist in astronomical mechanisms, Dutch watchmaker Christiaan van der Klaauw was the first, in 1999, to put a planetarium on the wrist. His Planetarium watch incorporates, at 6 o'clock, the smallest mechanical heliocentric planetarium ever made. It reproduces in real time the movements of Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn around the Sun. Knowing that Saturn takes 29.46 years to complete its revolution of the Sun, the extraordinary technical skills required to create this mechanism suddenly become clear. The Planetarium also displays hours, minutes, date and month on a black aventurine glass dial – another world-first – whose incredible depth creates an almost three-dimensional starry sky. Working with aventurine glass is no easy task and the technique developed by Christiaan van der Klaauw is, understandably, a well-kept secret.