Last year, for the brand’s 50th anniversary, Christianaan van der Klaauw introduced Grand Planetarium Eccentric. It was a 44mm platinum or rose gold watch with eight hand-drawn celestial bodies swirling the Aventurine dial. That’s already very impressive. Well, a few weeks ago, when I met Pim Koeslag, CEO of the Dutch brand with Geneva watches and wonders, he showed me a new version. I was quickly blown away by the results and had to share my admiration for it with Fratelli.
Luckily, on my way to the Christianaan van der Klaauw booth, I came across Morgan Sieghe, a former photographer of Fratello. I asked him to take some shots “quickly” but they didn’t come out that badly. However, before we look at the met stone version of the Grand Planetarium Eccentric, we will first introduce the brand of the watch and the “regular” version.
Christiaan van der Klaauw
Christiaan van der Klaauw is a Dutch watchmaker who has been making astronomical watches and watches since 1974. With unique complications such as the most accurate 3D moon phase display and miniature planetaria, he pays tribute to famous Dutch astronomers like Christian Heagens and Eiseilla. The former discovered the Saturn ring and invented the pendulum motion for clocks in the 17th century. The latter built a planetarium on the ceiling of his living room between 1774 and 1781.
In 2009, designer couples Daniel and Maria Reingers took over the brand from Christian van der Krau. They were internationally known and collaborated with, for example, Van Cleef & Alpers of the Lady Pers Planetarium and worked together to create the brand. In 2018, the watch won the GPHG Women’s Intricate Award and recently entered the universe of Kerian Flynn’s wrist during an all-female spaceflight at Blue Origin. In 2021, CVDK won the GPHG Award in the Calendar and Astronomy Clock category at Planetarium eise Eisinga.
Since 2022, Pim Koeslag, former technical director of Frederique Constant, has held a majority stake in the Christianaan van der Klaauw brand.
Grand Planetarium Eccentric
Grand Planetarium Eccentric is still a collaboration between the three parties. Daniel and Maria Reinges were responsible for the design, while Pym and Christian van der Krauw were responsible for the technical aspects. This is one of the brand’s mini planetarias, and this is the first time Uranus and Neptune have been featured. Christian van der Krau himself is responsible for calculating the planet’s orbit. That’s why Grand Planetarium Eccentric is the only mechanical planetarium clock in the world where mercury, Venus, Earth (and its moon), Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune move around the Sun.
They do so in the time they need in real life, and the trajectory is eccentric. Additionally, the hour and minute are displayed in the center hand, but the miniature Planet Earth track corresponds to months and zodiac. The planetarium module is part of a new movement. The Caliber CKM-01 was developed alongside Movement Maker Uhrteil AG, a venture by watchmaker Andreas Strehler. It features 32 gems, runs at a frequency of 21,600VPH and holds a power reserve of 60 hours. This movement includes a star-shaped bridge and a skeletonized gold-plated brass rotor with tungsten weight.
Last year’s version was available in a 44mm case made in either rose gold or platinum. But what is the best material to use in such an astronomical watch than a met stone?
Grand Planetarium Eccentric Met Stone
The idea for the metstone case came from Pim Koeslag. He says he worked with Atelier des Monaco materials for dials and more, but he had not filed an entire lawsuit since then. He began with the idea of making only the bezel from met stones. But then he was able to buy 1.09kg metstone, consisting of 92% iron, 7.5% nickel, and cobalt, so he asked the case maker if he could create an entire 44mm case. He tried it on a CNC machine equipped with a tungsten carbide drill.
But in the end he was able to manufacture two cases each made of 47 grams of metstone. The plan was to make three of that 1 kilogram of met stone. Unfortunately, the third one failed because the material is porous. The remaining two cases show the beautiful crystalline texture of the material. This is only visible when the nucleus of the metstone cools slowly over millions of years. When you see it in real life, it almost brightens because it reflects the light around you very well.
There is also a met stone ring on the dial. This contains five actual fragments of the naclite metstone, which originated from the volcanic eruptions on Mars. Pym discovered these in yet another metstone, and the piece located between Mars and Jupiter means the asteroid belt. This is the area of space between the orbit of Mars and Jupiter, where most of the asteroids in the solar system orbits are known to orbit the Sun.
The final words
In short, this is one of the amazing watches you really have to look at. Morgan’s photos are fantastic, but the feeling of holding this watch and seeing its crazy texture is hardly expressed in words. If you are interested in astronomy and clocks, the Christianaan van der Klaauw Grand Planetarium Eccentric met stones could be one of your Holy Grail clocks. You can talk about the origin of metstones, the type of metstones, the age of the material, and more. Luckily, the brand has a very useful landing page that explains everything. There will also be a 10-minute lecture by Niek de Kort, an astrophysicist who helped Christian van der Klaauw during the development of the clock.
Regular production Christiaan van der Klaauw Grand Planetarium Eccentric costs 208,000 euros in rose gold, including VAT, and 227,000 euros in platinum. As mentioned before, the metstone version must be a limited edition of three pieces. Each price is 580,000 euros excluding VAT. The two have already been made and I think they sold. In the third case, the people of Christiaan van der Klaauw still need to find a part of the appropriate met stone.
In the comments below, let us know what you think about the CVDK Grand Planetarium Eccentric Met stones.
Thank you again to Morgan Saiignes for helping with the photos!
