Speake-Marin Brown Serpent Calendar

In 2004, the independent Swiss brand founded by a British watchmaker, Peter Neville Speake, known as Speake-Marin, introduced a timepiece with a calendar hand christened the Serpent Calendar. Thirteen years later, in 2017, this essential item from the J-Class collection, famous for its elegant simplicity, is back in a new version: the Brown Serpent Calendar.

The unusual quality of a Speake-Marin watch is that it is easy to identify even if you are several yards away from the person wearing it. The shape of the watch case, the lugs linking it to the strap, the delicate silhouette of the hands, the dial, often with white enamel… All these visual codes bear the signature of the watchmaker based in Bursins, in the canton of Vaud, a few miles from Lausanne. The Brown Serpent Calendar model is no exception to these aesthetic “rules“, but has also kept its own identity.

The timepiece still has the famous tubular watch case named “Piccadilly”, completed by a prominent, cone-shaped and fluted crown with straight, structured and modular lugs. Designed in titanium and 42mm in diameter, it houses the Vaucher 3002 calibre, an automatic movement driving the displays at the centre of the dial and providing some 50 hours of power reserve. The mechanism is partially visible through the sapphire glass back on the case.

With a multi-layered, satin-finished dial, the Brown Serpent Calendar face has a curved and even rounded effect. This curved structure contains the hand-read date scale in the form of Arabic numerals, with the first day of the month offset at 1.30. The date is shown by a golden serpentine hand set at the heart of the dial. It is joined by a couple of blued hands of the Foundation type showing the hours and the minutes, as well as a long second hand that is also blued. While the minute track runs discreetly along the chapter ring, the hour rim has been brought to the front, and written in white Roman numerals on a chocolate-coloured central ring. The Brown Serpent Calendar watch is in a limited edition of 28 pieces.