We took a close look at our friend Brighty’s Christopher Ward Bel Canto Viola, and bring you this review.
Many thanks to Brighty for the loan of his personal watch for this review.
Review: Christopher Ward Bel Canto Viola
The Christopher Ward Bel Canto Viola has a retail price of SGD 5,195 before taxes. The price includes free delivery worldwide, and is available from the Christopher Ward website.
Historical perspective
Founded in England in 2004, Christopher ward was one of the first online-only watch brand, selling directly to the collector. In 2014, it merged with one of its partners, Synergies Horlogèries (SH) to bring in the manufacture in-house.
The watch and case
The brand is well known as making watches at accessible prices. And the Bel Canto is no exception. Bel Canto – translated from Italian to Beautiful Song, hints at the chiming capabilities of this watch. With a dial side complication, bearing all, the watch is an hour striker. Making one precise strike of its gong once every hour, on the hour when armed. It can also be made to go silent with a push of a button.
The case is a typical tonneau shaped three piece case. In the Bel Canto Viola, this is constructed in titanium. A crown operating the time setting and winding is mounted at two o’clock, and a pusher to arm or to disarm the striker is at the 4 o’clock position. The dial is a bright purple anodised base plate and elements of the dial, the movement are mounted on this plate. This construction is similar to what MB&F does for their Legacy Machine series.
The entire case back is closed, and engraved to show the motif of sound waves emerging from the center. We don’t think this aids in the dispersion of the sound as the striking system is on the dial side, and the case back sits on the skin of the wrist, but it looks cool.
The dial and movement
The movement is driven a Sellita SW200-1 as the base timekeeping train with the in-house Christopher Ward FS01 module. The FS01 is the striking module, and is completely exhibited on the dial side. At 12 o’clock, is a sub-dial carrying the hour and minute hands. This sub-dial is skeletonised, with raised bar numerals. The hands are also stick shaped. Both the hands and the indices are in-filled with lume. The sub-dial is held in place, floating over the purple dial plate by a bridge, which curved up from the base. The bridge is machined, and rather industrial looking. The rest of the wheel train is not visible and is under the dial plate.
But what is visible is below the sub-dial. The entire mechanism for the hour striker is exposed. On the right is a column wheel to switch between the strike-silent mode. The charging system for the hammer’s spring is in the middle, taking center stage. Two cocks in the center hold the hammer in its jewel setting on the left and the sound/silent indicator with its red hand on the right.
A long gong is mounted on the circumference of the dial. This looks like the cathedral gong used by Patek Philippe in their famous striking watches. The sound of the Bel Canto strike is rather soft, but the tone is quite melodious, no doubt due to this long gong going around the dial. The sound has a distinct attack and slow decay, which though not loud, can pierce through background noise and be easily discerned in a room which is not too noisy.
How the strike works
The hammer itself is placed under tension by a spring. This spring is tensioned by a very simple snail device driven directly by the wheel train. As the snail rides the turning finger which is driven by the wheel train, it tensions the spring. At the end of the hour, the finger falls off the edge of the snail, causing the tensioned spring to release, unleashing the hammer to strike the gong.
The strike/silent mode is controlled by the pusher at 4 o’clock, which turns the column wheel via a lever hidden below the dial plate. A simple lever rides the column wheel, to either arm the hammer (when the lever is riding the turret), or disarm (with the lever on the space between the turrets). When disarmed, the lever lifts the entire hammer assembly away from being able to reach the gong. This means that the hammer continues to strike whether the watch is in silent mode or striking mode, and thus the power reserve of the entire watch remains the same regardless of the mode it is in. This power reserve is 38 hours.
Competitive Landscape
By definition, the Bel Canto is a Sonnerie, or a striking watch which uses a gong to make a sound. In general, striking watches are rather much more expensive. And the Bel Canto is probably the least expensive example in the landscape.
One hour striker is the Chopard Strike One in ethical white gold goes for SGD 94k. And another is the A. Lange & Söhne Zeitwerk Striking Time in platinum with silver dial was EUR 75k, pink gold with silver dial EUR 62k in 2014. Philosophically, both are similar in function to the Bel Canto, providing timekeeping with a single gong strike at the top of the hour. Of course, both of these are in precious metal cases and in addition the Lange combines the sonnerie with their formidable Zeitwerk digital system. And of course, the exclusivity and finishing is not in the same ball park. But at prices which are 40 times higher than the Christopher Ward.
Concluding thoughts
This is a remarkable watch. An hour striker, which is rather handsome looking coming in at about the SGD 5k price mark. The construction is very clever, including the finishing choices made. Parts of the case, which the user can feel and touch are very nicely machined, polished and matted. The feel of the case is very nice. The parts which are visible are a bit shouty in the sense that the mechanism of the strike system is fully exposed, and set on a bright purple dial plate. More sedate hues are also available, and Christopher Ward’s latest release is the Bel Canto Classic with a guilloché dial plate, available in several colour options.
The rest of the finishing is rather industrial. But this is not to be unexpectedl. Especially at this very attractive price point. We will be happy with this level finnisage even at double or even triple Christopher Ward’s asking price. And hence, the Bel Canto is excellent value. A highly refreshing watch. And well recommended.
