Hublot Arsham Splash, Patek Philippe 6104 Celestial, Lange Tourbillon & Corum $20 Coin Watch

INTRO Welcome to another edition of What’s on My Desk. We have an architectural timepiece, a watch that reminds me of Game of Thrones — my moon and my stars — a very special Lange Tourbillon, and a gold coin watch like no other. HUBLOT MP-07 ARSHAM SPLASH To understand the watch you have to understand how we got here. Daniel Arsham originally wanted to be an architect. Even though it didn’t work out, that way of thinking never left him. Instead of focusing on how things are built, he became obsessed with what happens to them over time. How do they change? How do they erode? How do they collapse? The idea of subtracting material instead of adding defines everything that he does. The case doesn’t feel traditionally engineered — it feels carved, like material was removed until this exact shape was left behind. The splash opening on the dial isn’t just a design detail. It’s meant to capture the exact moment a droplet hits a surface and spreads outward, frozen in time. This language shows up across his objects for living: chairs, tables that look soft and almost melting, like they were in the middle of breaking down. He’s even experimented with Play-Doh to create organic forms before turning them into cast bronze and resin pieces. What you’re seeing here is that same idea translated into titanium and sapphire. Hublot didn’t just partner with an artist. They let him shape the watch itself. Their whole identity is built around the art of fusion — mixing materials, disciplines, ideas. Arsham had already been working with them on large-scale installations before this. The Mecca 10 movement is very structured, very mechanical, almost industrial in its layout — a power reserve display like a machine, not a traditional dial. Wrap it in a case that feels soft and fluid and it becomes a really interesting contrast. The green accents reference oxidation, like the watch has already started to age. The sapphire has a raw matte feel rather than high-polish gloss, which is actually harder to achieve when working with crystal. PATEK PHILIPPE 6104 CELESTIAL — BAGUETTE DIAMOND My personal grail watch is the Patek 5002 Sky Moon Tourbillon — at the time one of the most complicated watches Patek ever made, double-sided, with an actual astronomical display on the back showing the stars, moon phase, and the way the sky moves in real time. Instead of leaving that as a feature of one of the most complicated watches ever made, Patek took it out and built an entire watch around it. That’s where the Celestial comes in. In 2002 they introduced the reference 5102, and the sky display is no longer hidden on the back — it becomes the entire focus of the piece. The 5102 was very niche. Towards the end of production they released the 5102 PR — two-tone rose gold and platinum. Production was extremely limited, generally accepted to be under 100 pieces, and it doesn’t show up in the market regularly. The next step was the 6104. The case became 44mm, it leans more into a modern luxury feel, especially with the baguette bezel version we have here. How is it built? Three sapphire discs stacked on top of each other — one for the sky, one for the stars, one for the moon — each moving at a different speed to recreate actual sky motion. On top of that: moon phase, lunar orbit, date, and the timing when the moon and Sirius cross the meridian. The oval on the dial represents the portion of sky visible from Geneva’s latitude — that’s a very Patek detail. Precise. Intentional. Inside: the caliber 240 LU CL, part of Patek’s micro-rotor family. Thin, reliable, allows the complications on top. A. LANGE & SÖHNE TOURBILLON REF. 704.032 Lange & Söhne was originally founded in 1845 in Glashütte by Ferdinand Adolf Lange, who transformed a mining town into a center for precision watchmaking. After World War II, everything disappeared — the factory was destroyed, the company nationalized in 1948. For more than 40 years, Lange simply did not exist. After the fall of the Berlin Wall, Walter Lange returned, partnered with Günter Blümlein, and set out to rebuild from the ground up. On October 24, 1994, inside the Dresden Royal Palace, they relaunched with four watches: the Lange One, the Saxonia, the Arkade, and the Tourbillon Pour le Mérite. The Lange One changed everything. Every dress watch at the time followed a symmetrical layout. The Lange One was completely different — off-center time display, oversized date, power reserve, small seconds, none of it lined up as expected, but somehow it all worked perfectly. The entire dial is built on the golden ratio. The oversized date was inspired by the five-minute clock at the Semper Opera House in Dresden. The Lange One wasn’t just a new model — it reintroduced German watchmaking to the world and immediately positioned Lange alongside Patek Philippe. This limited edition Lange One Tourbillon in rose gold — 250 pieces. Lange didn’t redesign the watch. They respected it. The asymmetrical layout is still intact. The oversized date is still there. The identity hasn’t changed. They integrated a tourbillon into the architecture in a way that feels like it belongs, not like it was added just to impress. Most tourbillons are front and center at 6 o’clock — the whole point is to show it off. They did it subtly here, in order to respect the original design. It still feels like the first Lange One. CORUM $20 DOUBLE EAGLE COIN WATCH What you’re looking at is not just a watch — it’s an actual piece of history turned into a timepiece. To understand what this is, you have to separate it from what most people think of when they think coin watch. Brands like Patek Philippe and Cartier were already making coin watches decades earlier, but those were hidden watches — you’d open the coin and inside was a small dial. More of a novelty, almost like a secret object. What Corum did in 1964 was completely different. They took a real $20 Double Eagle coin, physically cut it into two halves, and built the watch inside. No hinge, no opening mechanism. The coin itself became the watch. One half becomes the dial side, the other becomes the caseback. In between: an ultra-thin movement sandwiched inside. That’s why these watches are so slim — the entire watch is engineered around the thickness of the coin. The case edge is coin edge — that’s what keeps the watch from looking like a watch with a coin dial. From the side, it still reads like a coin. This specific watch takes it further with an 18-karat yellow gold bracelet. They took the coin edge from the coin and translated it onto the sides of the bracelet. The bracelet doesn’t interrupt the design — it continues it. Same color, same material, same weight, same coin edge on the sides of the bracelet. It becomes a continuous gold form. The $20 Double Eagle was minted from the mid-1800s into the early 1900s — 22-karat gold, Liberty on one side, eagle on the other. When you’re wearing this, you’re not just wearing a gold watch. You’re wearing something that started as currency, was taken out of circulation, became a collectible, and was then turned into a watch. Corum made coin watches for a long time, so the idea itself isn’t rare. But this specific configuration — $20 Double Eagle coin, automatic movement, full 18-karat yellow gold bracelet — bracelet versions like this are far less common and feel very different on the wrist. What makes this watch interesting is the concept. You took something that was literally money and turned it into time.