Chatham is a luxury watch boutique that offers some of the most prestigious watch brands in the world including Omega, IWC and Jaeger-LeCoultre. With a great selection and highly knowledgeable employees, this place epitomizes class.
The Selection
A watch can tell a lot about a person. For some a luxury watch is a subtle display of status but for others it is a passion. Luxury timepieces are immaculate works of art crafted by skilled artisans. Are they expensive? Of course, but a luxury watch is an investment, that more often than not appreciates in value over time. Finding authorized agents for renown brands can be a painstaking task in Sri Lanka, so having a multi-brand boutique like Chatham is a real godsend.
They currently offer Omega, Cartier, IWC, Jaeger-LeCoultre and Chopard. The prices start at Rs. 400,000 for all the way up to Rs. 10 million depending on the build material (steel, gold, titanium, etc), movement and special features (tourbillon, jewel encrusted). If they don’t happen to have a a model that you’re looking for just let them know and they’ll bring it down, granted that it’s one of their authorized brands.
Omega
Omega is one of the most popular mainstream luxury Swiss brands. Chatham has a great selection of their designs and watch types from divers, to chronographs, to their ever popular Constellation range.
For the diver range they’ve got the Seamaster Professional and the Planet Ocean models which both come with a unidirectional and bidirectional(GMT) rotating bezel, helium escape valve, sapphire glass crystal, a depth rating of 1000ft and 2000ft respectively and Omega’s in-house movements.
Another popular range is the Speedmaster range which is quite iconic since it was the watch worn by Buzz Aldrin during the lunar landing. Hence dubbed the moonwatch. The latest rendition of the Speedmaster comes with a c0-axial movement which significantly reduces friction, improves mechanical efficiency and shock resistance.
Jaerger-LeCoultre
JLC is another of the pioneers of the Swiss watch industry, recently celebrating their 180th anniversary. Jaeger-LeCoultre is known particularly for their Master Ultra Thin range and their Reverso range.
The Master Ultra Thin range (adjectives much?) is called such because well it is ridiculously thin. At 4 mm – 4.5 mm in thickness, watches in this range are around one third the thickness of a standard watch. Looking at it from the side had us wondering how they even managed to fit in a mechanical movement in such a thin form factor.
The Reverso range is yet another iconic design by JLC. The name Reverso derives from one very special feature- the flippable watch face. There’s whole bunch of variation in this range with some watches having two watch faces on the opposite side of the case, some with exhibition movements and others with custom engraving space. This is actually brilliant since the two faces of the case can be of two completely different styles, one could be jewel encrusted while the other is more understated and suited for business attire.
Cartier & Chopard
Both Cartier and Chopard are known for their high jewellery creations which have transitioned into their watches. Both of these companies, Cartier from France and Chopard from Switzerland are not exclusives to watches unlike Omega and JLC. They are highly renown for their jewellery ranges and that style is quite apparent in their watch designs as well.
One that particularly caught my interest was the Chopard Monaco Historique which is a titanium racing chronograph. This range was created to celebrate the 700th anniversary of the Grimaldi Dynasty. This is also the official timekeeper for the Grand Prix De Monaco Historique. The key feature of this watch is it’s titanium case which makes this watch extremely light, and as such it should be since it is meant to be worn for racing.
Ambience and Service
Chatham isn’t your run-of-the-mill watch store, and you’ll notice this as soon as you set foot into the showroom. The entire setting is very elegant, clean and luxuries with some tasteful chandeliers lighting the showroom and even a small lounge area where you can sit and talk about watches. Considering the market that these watches are targeted at, this is an ideal theme.
The service at Chatham was a real highlight and something that really impressed me. I’ve been to numerous other watch stores in Sri Lanka where I’ve come across employees that have only a very basic knowledge of the timepieces they sell. When someone is looking to purchase a watch that costs Rs. 400k upwards, the agent should able to give any information the customer needs to know, and Chatham was one of the only places that actually knew more about the watches than I did. Besides that, the guys here are very polite, courteous and will take the time to explain any details that you need to know.
Conclusion
Luxury watches don’t come cheap, but for those who are looking to buy a quality time piece, we can’t think of a better, more reliable place than Chatham Luxury Watches.
