Manufacturer: Marc Newson Year: Circa 2015 Model Name: The Marc Newson Hour Glass Material: Borosilicate glass and gold-plated stainless steel Dimensions: 150mm overall height Signed: Hour glass signed by Marc Newson Accessories: Accompanied by blank Marc Newson certificate, product literature, gloves and fitted transportation case.
Catalogue Essay
An amazing sight to behold, the Marc Newson Hour Glass is far more sophisticated than it looks. Hand-blown in the workshops of HG-Timepieces by Marc Newson in Basel, Switzerland, a long tube of borosilicate glass is precisely loaded onto a turning machine with a combination of special torches and blown through a rubber tube by the artisan to heat and shape the hourglass to a specific measurement of three various sizes, 300mm height (for the 60-minute hour glass), 240mm height (for the 30-minute hour glass) and 150mm height (for the 10-minute hour glass). Executed to precision, inside the hour glass features gold or silver plated stainless steel balls referred to “nanoballs” each individual piece specifically sized at 0.6mm. Replacing the use of sand featured in traditional hour glasses, these tiny “nanoballs” enables a precision of +/-2 minutes, which can be considered very precise for an hour glass.
Launched in 2015, the Marc Newson Hour Glass is a true horological feat stringed with superb engineering principles enabling precision timing. The present example is a 10-minute hour glass with an exact number of 1’249’996 gold-plated stainless steel “nanoballs” inside the borosilicate glass. Offered with its full set of accessories, this present example is certainly a fun horological timing device that steps outside its traditional boundaries. Famously quoted by the man himself, "The Hourglass is all about time but in a more esoteric and fundamental way. I was thinking of having fun with time." - Marc Newson.