Greetings, new millenium. It is I, the Freak. Good luck wearing your grandfather's watch now. Image © Watchfinder

“Here’s to the crazy ones, the misfits, the rebels, the troublemakers, the round pegs in the square holes… the ones who see things differently -they’re not fond of rules, and they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them, but about the only thing you can’t do is ignore them because they change things...because the ones who are crazy enough to think that they can change the world, are the ones who do.” I swear that’s not from my autobiography, it's from a 1980s Apple ad. But I think that’s what my creators had in mind when they named me The Freak -that and “freakishly awesome” was too long a name to fit on a Baselworld poster. I will say it took a while for me to get used to my name. Though entirely aware and proud of how crazy I am, I always thought I look pretty handsome, too.

If I asked you from whence you think I hailed and gave you two possibilities -a historical Swiss high horology manufacture or DARPA’s secret R&D facilities, which one would seem more likely? To the best of my knowledge, it was the former. But that doesn’t mean my creators weren’t more like mad scientists than traditional watchmakers. The idea started in the mind of Carole Forestier-Casapi, a young horological engineer who now firmly sits on the throne as the industry’s most respected technical genius. Her idea was...not too shabby. It won the Breguet prize for horological innovation, in which she was the sole female applicant. Rumour has it Louis Breguet himself rose from the grave to give her a handshake and tip his hat, but this I cannot confirm.

Me in my latest iteration -the Freak S. This is not a DARPA engineered clandestine signals intelligence gathering device for astronauts (I promise). It is a watch. Image © Watches by SJX

What I can confirm is that the technical brilliance required to bring this idea to fruition and create a reliable watch probably rivals that behind most DARPA projects to date. It took the combined intellect of Carole Forestier-Casapi and Ludwig Oechslin, the manufacturing prowess at Ulysse Nardin and their partners, and the unwavering dedication to creating the impossible of Rolf Schnyder. And the results were...freakishly awesome. I had the largest barrel spring ever fitted to a watch -a fact well known among lady watches to this day, might I add. I was the first watch to use silicon, with my silicon escapement wheel. I was the first watch with a carousel that contained my entire movement, meaning I did not require those useless ancient contraptions called a dial and hands. I also had no crown -you set my time by rotating my bezel.

What I can also confirm is the impact my invention had, not only for Ullysse Nardin, but the entire watch industry as a whole. In short, it ushered in a new era: the era of the modern watch. Journalists and watch industry veterans wax poetically about how I heralded the start of avant-garde design and technical innovation, or even inspired other independent watchmakers to follow in my footsteps. Max Busser said that I “opened the door for them all by demonstrating the full expressive potential of mechanical watches and underscored the true raison d’etre for watchnaking today, which is to give emotion”. Even the New York Times declared that I “changed the face of contemporary watchmaking”. But, all due respect, that is selling me short. It wasn't just my avant-garde design that made me special. My design stemmed purposefully from a desire for extreme technical innovation -the definition of form serving function.

Indeed, when I look around today, I see lots of watches using silicon for their components. I suppose it didn't take very long for other brands to appreciate the technical benefits of a material that seemed entirely alien when I first introduced it. And as wild as some watches look these days, as technically impressive as people make them out to be, how many other watches have you seen whose entire movement rotates inside a carousel? In my mind, I was the Lamborghini Miura of watches -the first super-watch, if you will. Like me, the Miura was first and foremost a technical achievement: it was the first sports car with a mid-engined layout, vastly improving weight distribution and handling. And like me with silicon, most other carmakers followed Lamborghini's footsteps and made mid-engined supercars. But try driving a Miura today -I hope you didn’t skip leg day this week; enjoy that clutch and steering.

The Lamborghini Miura, known as the first supercar. It shocked the world with its design and mid-engined layout. She is my spirit animal in the car world. Image © Robb Report

My collectors, many of whom own vintage Lamborghinis, tell me that unlike my vehicular counterpart, even by today's standards I look and feel every bit as modern as I did in 2001. And while I am proud that I inspired independent watchmakers to create an entirely new type of watch and adore some of their pieces, I am perpetually plagued by a painful problem: I have yet to find my other half. You might look at me and think all is well in my life (after all, I am a certified icon), but all this success doesn’t mean much to me unless I have someone to share it with. And while I like hanging out with watches from brands like MB&F, De Bethune, Richard Mille, Urwerk and Hublot, in my mind they are not even half as crazy as I am. The famous American poetry troupe Greenday knows exactly how I feel: “I walk a lonely road, the only one that I have ever known. Don't know where it goes, but it's home to me and I walk alone”. That said, I am optimistic that one day someone will once again make a watch that radically changes how people view my entire species. I just hope they do it in this century, and that I am not too old for her when that comes to pass.

A lot has changed since my halcyon days back in 2001. What started as a single Freak (moi) has grown into an entire family. Today I count the Freak X, the Freak One, and the Freak S as my brothers, each progressively a more complicated version of the last. Silicon is abundant in my more recent iterations, found not only in the escapement wheel, but the hairspring and the balance wheel, too. I have been responsible for more patent filings than a Silicon Valley tech startup, I have appeared at numerous fancy auctions fetching many multiples of my original retail price, and I am truly cherished by those lucky enough to have me adorn their wrist. And at last, after more than two decades, I finally got my Oscar -the GPHG iconic prize award, a nice hat tip from the industry as a whole. But in another sense, it's all been business as usual. My raison d'etre has not changed since 2001. I am still a laboratory for the wrist. My subsequent iterations have faithfully been equal parts technical challenge and contemporary design exercise. And while a myriad attempts at modern watchmaking have surfaced, everyone seems to know who created the very world they now inhabit.

I wish I could say I hope to meet you one day, but if I am to be honest, that is quite unlikely. Since my birthyear, there have been, on average, less than 300 Freaks born annually. As you can imagine, I am not exactly a watch you can pump out with machines. And it will likely take you a while to acquire me if you visit one of my boutiques. And you won’t find practically any of me in the secondary market, because when one of my collectors tells me we might have to part ways, I gently remind them that they’ll never find another watch like me. So, for the time being, I apologize we cannot meet. All I can tell you is you ought to be happy I even exist, because if I don’t take that for granted, neither should you.

Peace out,

I, the Freak