After the Bauhaus-inspired HM2.2 Black Box Performance Art piece in 2009, beloved French watch designer Alain Silberstein is back with the Legacy Machine No. 1 Silberstein, working his magic once again on an MB&F classic.
By: Y-Jean Mun-Delsalle
When Maximilian Büsser was still working as the managing director for Harry Winston, he always made a point to stop by Alain Silberstein’s booth during BaselWorld, even though he had never personally met the master watchmaker. Their first formal encounter occurred in 2008, shortly after the launch of the Horological Machine No. 2, when they decided to create MB&F’s first-ever piece of performance art: reinterpretations of existing models by external artists and designers. Consequently, Silberstein teamed up with the horological concept lab in 2009 to design the HM2.2 Black Box. Now, for his second collaboration with Max Büsser & Friends, Silberstein has brought the “eternal time” of the universe into the watch movement of the Legacy Machine No. 1. Silberstein. His goal was to make time more human, which he did by updating the oversized balance wheel of 2011’s original LM1, slowly oscillating at 18,000 bph in front of the caliber and unconventionally floating above the dial.
“This timepiece follows the principle of a coffee machine: Eternal time is filtered through the central escapement above, and flows—drop of time by drop of time—on to the two small dials positioned below,” Silberstein says. “It resonated with the LM1 because by highlighting the balance—the mechanism that splits time into minuscule increments—it highlights how man converts eternal time into something he can use.”
The story of the LM1 Silberstein begins at BaselWorld 2012 when he discovered the original LM1. Although he congratulated Büsser for the watch, which he believed perfectly represented the quintessence of a timepiece—the visualization of unstoppable eternal time symbolized by the beating of the central escapement transformed into measurable time through dials and hands—he spontaneously suggested some modifications that he would have made, such as altering the shape of the subdials to resemble satellite dishes, which would better receive the drops of time stemming from the central escapement. Several months later, Büsser proposed to create the LM1 Silberstein. The project formally started around the end of 2012. Although the creative concept came to Silberstein rapidly, it required approximately three years to make the final prototype, which saw the light of day during the second half of 2015. Final testing and production began shortly after, leading to the watch’s preview at BaselWorld 2016 and launch last May.
Describing the experience of working with the MB&F team as a watchmaker’s dream, Silberstein says. “Creating a watch is about telling a story. The HM2 movement and the architecture of its dials immediately made me think of the 1930s Minox Riga camera with its two adjustment turrets.”
The main idea for the Black Box was to find the most streamlined shape possible and to conceive a simple container that attaches to HM2’s existing magnificent bracelet support.
“Max understood that his LM1 movement inspired me on a philosophical level through its manner of sublimating passing time,” says Silberstein. “It was a pleasure to create this watch around a movement that had so much meaning for me. The LM1 Silberstein perfectly expresses what I feel and expect from a watch today: to remind me both of eternal time and current time.”
So how do you take an existing timepiece in the MB&F repertoire and “Silberstein-ize” it? You make the two convex subdials on the original LM1 concave to capture eternal time and transform the dual arches of the balance bridge into a single sapphire crystal bridge to visually lighten it and avoid drawing attention away from the time indications and dial-side escapement. Then add high-gloss bright red, blue, and yellow on the concave hands and subdial markers for painless legibility of the two independent time zones (for both hours and minutes; unusual, as most dual time zone movements only allow the hours to be adjusted) against a matte backdrop. Next, convert the world’s first vertical power reserve indicator into a cone, cube, and sphere. This all makes sense when you consider that Silberstein had been among the first to create a timepiece with a sapphire crystal case and was a forerunner in instilling a sense of whimsy in haute horlogerie through his use of cheerful colors and avant-garde materials.
The creation of a curved sapphire crystal balance bridge that had exceptionally tight tolerances required to support the balance wheel took two years of development—all for a component designed to be invisible. Silberstein credits Serge Kriknoff, the Chief Technology Officer of MB&F, who succeeded in finding a manufacture willing to take up the challenge of producing a sapphire crystal bridge.
“We must stand firm and not be discouraged when people tell us that it’s impossible to make,” Silberstein explains. “Innovation is not an easy path! Through the use of a transparent bridge in sapphire, the central escapement and the two time-telling dials ‘dialogue’ perfectly with one another, without the obstacle of the original metal bridge. To my knowledge, it’s the first time that a shaped sapphire crystal bridge has been used, which needed many hours of studies and tests for its conception and reliability.”
The LM1 Silberstein’s 42.5 mm case is available in red gold, titanium, or black PVD-treated titanium (12 pieces in each metal), with a crown in the shape of a six-pointed star composed of two overlapping triangles featuring MB&F’s signature battle-axe logo. The manual-winding movement was built exclusively for the brand by Jean-François Mojon and his team at Chronode, together with independent watchmaker Kari Voutilainen.
“For nearly 25 years, Alain has managed to amaze me every single year!” exclaims Büsser. “Because he was not thinking of pleasing a potential customer, but rather expressing his own art, he is truly an innovator. At MB&F, we salute rebel thinkers and creative trailblazers. It was therefore an honor to create not just one piece with Alain, but two. The idea of our Performance Art pieces developed with external creators is precisely to blend two parallel worlds: ours and theirs. The result is a child that none of the parents could have created single-handedly.”
Although Paris-born, Silberstein now works as an independent watch designer in Besançon—the heart of France’s horological industry. After ceasing operations of his eponymous brand in 2012, he received training in interior architecture and model-making, after having worked as an interior designer long before he was creating groundbreaking watches.
In the past, he had collaborated with other watchmakers occasionally, such as with the Romain Jerome for its Subcraft, released in 2015. Favoring true collaborations, he isn’t interested in creating watches for other brands undercover without any mention of his name. The LM1 Silberstein is thus a 50/50 partnership, where each partner receives appropriate recognition for their work.
“There is a beautiful word in French to express who I am and what I do: a ‘maître d’oeuvre’ [project manager],” describes Silberstein of the difference between interior design and watchmaking. “Mastering a craft is the ability of a creator to transform his dreams or projects into reality. How? Through dialogue with people qualified in their fields. Don’t ask me to build a structure or a staircase myself—or even to hammer a nail, as my wife says—but I can talk to a carpenter to turn my project into a high-quality work. And it’s this confident dialogue that enriches all of my creations, be they architectural or horological.”