Modern life is punctuated by the sound of alarms. But these tinny ringtones are nothing compared to the robust sound that resonates from a vintage alarm watch. These watches were meant to be heard, and one listen transports you back to a time when all you needed to know was right there on your wrist.
Vulcain started it all back in the 1940s with the Cricket. Known as the watch of Presidents for being gifted to every U.S. President since Truman (except George W. Bush), the Cricket—despite the rarified nickname—has seen some of the world’s most forbidding climates. The jungles of the Amazon, the forbidding slopes of K2, even the deepest depths of the ocean—the Cricket has seen it all.
Not to be outdone, other brands, like Girard Perregaux, started releasing their own versions of wrist alarm watches throughout the 1950s.
This particular example, dating from the 1960s, is one of the most aesthetically sophisticated takes on the genre. Featuring a 35mm stainless steel case, "pie-pan" style silver dial with applied indices, and framed by a period-correct domed acrylic crystal, this beauty is powered by the manually-wound AS calibre 1475.
While most alarm watches feature an inner rotating bezel on the perimeter of the dial, this GP is a bit more demure, only exposing the alarm ring above 6 o'clock.
Exquisite.
The Cricket and Memovox may be the go-to choices in this watch genre, but set yourself apart with this GP, the thinking man's alarm.