Pierre Biver of J.C. Biver, Jasper Lijfering of Amsterdam Vintage Watches, and Erik Gustafson of Hairspring Watches join me in three separate conversations to provide a holistic overview of stone dials.
Over the past few years, stone dials have seemingly popped up everywhere. More modern brands are making them. At the same time, vintage examples have become more collectible and jumped in price considerably.
But stone dials are still a relatively undiscovered corner of watch collecting. They're not well understood on the vintage or modern side.
So I wanted to cover them on Hodinkee. Typically, we'd do this by talking to a few experts and synthesizing those conversations into an in-depth article. But I decided to try something different this time around, hitting record on three conversations to learn about modern stone dial production, vintage collecting, and everything in between.
Our first conversation is with Pierre Biver, who started J.C. Biver with his father Jean-Claude Biver last year. Each of their releases has included a stone dial option. Then, I talk with two dealers. First is Jasper Lijfering of Amsterdam Vintage Watches, a vintage dealer and trained gemologist. Second is Erik Gustafson of Hairspring Watches, who has helped grow the scholarship around stone dials. We dive into the recent discussion around Rolex "obsidian" dials; as we'll discuss, this name isn't quite accurate and it shows how much there still is to learn about vintage watches, and stone dials in particular.
I hope all three conversations give you a better understanding of stone dials. Note that I've tried to include links to an example of all stone dials mentioned in the audio, so check the show notes below if you're not sure what a particular stone looks like.
Show Notes
1:23: Hands-On: The Biver Automatique
2:14: Hands-On: The Biver Carillon Tourbillon
19:30: Hands-On: The Berneron Mirage Realizes Its Creator's Uncompromising Vision
24:00: Hands-On: Baltic Prismic Stone Dial Limited Editions
31:54: Amsterdam Vintage Watches
33:35: In-Depth: How Piaget Defined The 1970s, And How It Can Do The Same Today
38:15: Example of a Rolex Day-Date with Malachite dial
39:16: Example of a Rolex Day-Date with Coral dial
41:53: Dr. Helmut Crott's The Dial
42:45: Example of a Rolex Day-Date with black Onyx dial
43:15: Example of a Piaget Protocole with Lapis Lazuli dial
43:28: Example of a Rolex Day-Date with Tiger's Eye dial
45:20: Example of a Rolex Day-Date with Green Jasper dial
46:30: Example of a Rolex Day-Date with Pyramid Onyx dial
46:55: Jasper's white gold Datejust with Red Jasper dial
52:05: Rolex Day-Date with 'Bloodstone' dial
54:10: Hairspring Watches
56:00: Hairspring's post about the "Obsidian" dial Rolex Datejust
58:45: Recapping The Glamorous Day-Date Sale At Phillips (That Time The Average Day-Date Sold For $110,580)
1:00:00: "Obsidian" Rolex at Phillips in 2020
1:02:30: Rolex Day-Date Khanjar with "Obsidian" dial that Loupe This described as "although it looks like an onyx stone dial, after closer inspection it appears the dial is a painted/ lacquer dial."
1:11:58: Rolex Daytona ref. 116500 "Lemon" dial