With its finely sculpted honey-colored gold body, this 2010 Glashuette Original Strasser & Rohde Regulator sports a beautifully executed hand-wound mechanism that features a level of decor that we rarely see even in this price range. I expect the hand-made caliber with its different types of guilloche, blued screws, and visible synthetic rubies will get almost as much “screen time” as the timekeeper’s silvered dial with its rare regulator-type display.
The Strasser & Rohde Regulator is a tribute to the long-gone Strasser & Rohde Glashütte i/Sa. manufacture that used to make excellent pendulum clocks and marine chronometers. Established back in 1875, the company existed for more than eighty years before being nationalized by the communists.
In fact, the model in question sports a dial layout, which is inspired by one of the Strasser & Rohde “Halbsekunden-Präzisionspendeluhr” regulator clocks that the company has presented in 1896. And, frankly, compared to all the recent deliberately high-tech watches (like this Girard-Perregaux Traveller Large Date or this Carl F. Bucherer Patravi TravelTec) this new model really feels like a welcome change of pace.
Compared to the Jaquet Droz Grande Heure Onyx that took the idea of a simple regulator to the farthest possible extreme, the Strasser & Rohde is a more, um, regular type of a regulator.
Just like the “Halbsekunden-Präzisionspendeluhr”, the new wristwatch has a regulator-style dial with a long central minute hand and a couple of sub-dials. The one at 12 o’clock displays hours using a rather short and sturdy blued steel onion-shaped hand that points at finely printed Roman numerals, while the other, located at 6 o’clock, counts seconds. Even the railway-style minute tack seems to be almost the same as that on the 1896 model.
The central minute hand that takes the main position on the dial has a different shape than the one on the source of their inspiration. Its curved profile is a kind of homage to a more modern version of the clock that was released in the 1920s.
The Glashutte Original Strasser & Rohde Regulator is powered by the GO 49-04 hand-wound caliber. As usual, the movement is exquisitely decorated by hand and is seen through a sapphire crystal that almost fully consumes the case back. As usual for the brand, the mechanism with all of its painstakingly decorated parts is the main point of attraction of the Regulator.
Like some other “historic” models that were recently introduced by Glashütte Original, this timekeeper is presented in a rather large (for a dress watch) mirror-polished rose gold body. Whole 42 millimeters in diameter, the case is almost 13 millimeters high, which is thick for a piece that is powered by a manually-wound movement.
Still, the proportions of the case are good enough for the watch to be worn with formal dress, if your physique is not particularly thin, of course.
Thanks to the use of blued hands and black numerals, the white dial offers almost unrivaled legibility, which may be only slightly undermined by the chosen regulator-style dial layout. However, if you are familiar with the design or just getting used to new things fast, this shouldn’t be a problem.
Regrettably, the German manufacture plans to limit the production of this beautiful piece of art to only 25 units, dramatically increasing its collector’s value, but leaving a great number of enthusiasts behind the lines.
See also: Bvlgari Diagono Retrograde Moonphase in Rose Gold Review
Photos: Glashütte Original
Glashutte Original Strasser & Rohde Regulator specification
Price: €19,500 (MSRP)
Movement: Glashutte Original GO 49-04, hand-wound, hand-decorated, in-house, adjusted in five positions, Made in Germany
Complications: Regulator
Case: Rose gold
Shape: Round
Transparent back: Yes, sapphire crystal
Size: 42.00 mm
Case height: 12.80 mm
Dial: White
Hands: Blue
Water resistance: 50 meters
Strap: Black leather
Crystal: Sapphire
Back: Sapphire