Sunday 11 October 2009

someday we'll find it, the rainbow connection... the lovers, the dreamers and me...

the kermit version of that song sticks in my head the most :) but onto the post... we're talking about colors of the rainbow dude...(cue stoned out hippy/surfer dude)

the normal RM11-FM
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why do people buy these watches? its because they're big and recognisable and known to be expensive. the nicer the color scheme the more expensive they must be no? :) i am not slagging off owners of these watches but i do tire of seeing color variation after color variation, mindless LE associations after mindless LE associations and its wearing pretty thin... i think its gotten to the point that its line dilutive impo and may put some folks off the brand as a whole.

Eg. when RM came on the scene it was amazing watch after amazing watch and there were so many desirable ones in the lineup at then not so crazy prices (if we only knew...) now all RM pieces have prices that have gone totally ballistic and in terms of nice new watches, its not a lot coming out each year now. those round hockey puck RMs are pretty shoddy stuff. at least they have the wonderful RM19 celtic knot tourby but at over half a million? hmm...

but back to the RM11... with its coming, the boyz who were buying RMs coz they were (1) big (2) recognisable (3) known to be very expensive, now knew that the RM5 would not do, nay even the RM10 may not be enough... i can hear it already... "its just a simple time only watch and every other guy in my exotic car owner club is gonna have 1... i need to stand out man. its gotta be one of the new colorful RM11s u know wat i mean" haha... the RM11 has the de riguer chrono complication for sports or sporty watches and as with the best of the AP Offshores and Hublot Big Bangs, its coming to you in multiple color combinations all with the added limited edition tags. [If u know not of my view of LEs, please read this article]

Rose Gold America Version [this one may work as its not Ti... if u ever need to refinish a Ti watch u will know why i say that...]
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...a vaucher base... a dubois depraz chrono module (ala the Royal Oak Offshore)... certain % ownership by AP... no real surprise they are coming out with color change LE after LE...the RM11, RM's offshore variant at 3 times the price. The Offshore though still probably wears the crown of having the most number of LEs for a successful luxury sports watch line out there even though Hublot is trying to prise it off em...

so why do they do it? simple... because there is demand. there are some folks out there who own many if not all the LE variants for the RM11 amongst the other RM they own. for 10 pieces made, the top 10 Authorised dealers for RM should be able to move 1 each relatively easily too... perhaps...

[ click to read the rest of the post... expand or collapse ]



in 2008 for the inaugural Singapore F1 race, RM launched the singapore F1
Limited Edition(50 pieces)... it had red flanges and red & white tones all about
... eg. 2,4,8,10 hour digits are in red and others in white... red and white are the singapore national flag colors fyi...
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zip forward a year later and another limited edition, this time of 10 pieces have been made... i don't see photos or press release info of this watch anywhere so here, exclusive for u is the 2009 richard mille rm11 singapore f1... list is also S$136k
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theres also the one to commemorate massa's crash and return (?)
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and this one for americas too
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AP is not to be outdone... viva las vegas!!!
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an then theres this interesting piece from AP... all the indications of an LE but not an LE. forged carbon case, ceramic bezel and the colors of the end of days(which is possibly the best ROO LE ever together with the RB2Ti) oh but it doesn't come cheap this one...
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so after this bombardment of color, what then? well for me personally, i hope that they improve on their brand/line strategy and not come out with sooo many color change LEs. sure churning out play toys for the rich wif excessive wealth and who aren't too too picky is fine, but for me i'm off these watches for now but u never know... i've learnt to never say never ;)

2 comments:

Basque said...

RM watches are difficult to justify at their price point. the thick watch trend is slowing as well.

i believe the trend is moving to big and thin as opposed to big and fat

raphael too said...

Hi Basque

Interesting points. Yup RMs pricing is hard to justify.

Big watches will be around for sure. I think that some people have come down from the uber big sizes but there are lots of fans for big watches out there.

good if u can share which watches u mean by big and thin. for sporty de bethune comes to my mind eg. db24 but its not a brand that appeals to me.

for classic, lange has big diameter and relatively thin watches i think eg the new 1815 which is really quite nice impo. the richard lange may be a tad too big for my personal taste though...

cheers
raph

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