Armin Strom Presents the New One Week First Edition with a Bolder In-House Movement

In 2010, Armin Strom introduced the One Week timepiece, which had a movement, developed and manufactured in-house. This laid the foundation for many of the Maison’s groundbreaking offerings. Now, for this year, the timepiece maker has unveiled a new design for One Week (Ref. ST23-OW.FE) with greater transparency and architectural finesse. 

So, how is an in-house movement different from an outsourced one? Most of the outsourced movements incorporated by other manufacturers are made by ETA , formerly known as Eterna. Most of the Swiss timepieces have ETA movements, as it's a subsidiary of the Swatch Group. On the other hand, an in-house movement or an in-house calibre is a watch movement that has been developed and manufactured by the brand itself for its watches. Using in-house movements enhances a brand’s reputation; from a horological perspective, such novelties have better power reserve and also create scope for better decorations on the movements.

The newly unveiled 41 mm Armin Strom’s One Week First Edition is crafted from stainless steel. It has integrated lugs and a polished bezel. The watch gets a black minute ring on the outer periphery of the dial with white minute marking and a small-second dial at 9 o’clock on the black dial with an Armin Strom insignia. Then there are faceted hour and minute hands, adorned with Super-LumiNova, which are very carefully placed at the centre on the open field of the dial. This is a departure from the signature asymmetrical hand placements, which are either relegated to subdials or marginally off-centre. Also, there are baton-shaped hour markers.

On the dial, there are two mainspring barrels held by two finger-style bridges and the motion of two ratchet wheels winding up the two barrels in opposite directions is entirely visible from the dial side. This provides a superior power reserve. Talking about power reserve, it is indicated by a mirror-polished cone system at 11 o’clock. The watch gets a light blue PVD-coloured mainplate and bridges.

Powering the watch is the in-house manual winding Calibre ARM21 with seven days of power reserve, courtesy of a double barrel system. Turning the watch over reveals the sapphire crystal caseback that shows off the whole movement, and the engraving of ‘First Edition’ and the individual watch number out of 25. Finishing the watch is an H-shaped stainless steel bracelet with a double folding clasp. The watch also comes with a 10-year warranty – twice as long as Armin Strom’s standard warranty.