Rexhepi is a handsome man with a strong jawline, a constant stubble, and boyish pointy ears. If Hollywood ever got hooked on watches and decided to make a biopic about Rexhepi, Tom Hardy would be the perfect choice for the role. He pays close attention to everything, not just his watches. Even the workbench he uses is his own design. His desk is piled high with notebooks filled with drawings of watches and mechanisms. Those notebooks were also designed by him. On the day we met, he was wearing a camel-colored knitted polo shirt and a matching sports coat. He cares so much about how he dresses that he talked about wanting to design his own one day. On his wrist is his famous vintage Rolex Milgauss, but he tells me he also has a few Daytonas from the same brand at home.
The Chronomètre Contemporain II is Rexhepi's current masterpiece and is considered by many to be one of the finest contemporary watches in the world.
Rexcepi's office is decorated with items that pass his smell test: a samurai sword, a handmade knife by Emanuel Esposito that clicks smoothly into place, like the gentle closure of a kitchen drawer. Rexcepi groans with satisfaction. “I love anything that's been made over time,” he says. On his desk is an open coffee-table book cataloguing vintage Patek Philippe watches. He admires the way these old watches are made. “I'd love to be able to recreate these dials, with all these little imperfections, exactly the same,” he says. “You couldn't do that if you didn't make watches the way they were made before. What I love about[Rexcepi's watches]is that they're new, but they're vintage watches.”
For him, the beauty of an old Patek, his Japanese sword or his own $2.3 million Antimagnetic is in its imperfection. The magic is in the meticulous artisan's relentless pursuit of perfection, knowing that a standard will be impossible to reach without automation. “This is our constraint. With the machines we use and the way we decorate, we can't make something perfect,” he says. “But we try, we try a little. It may not be perfect, but that's what gives it character. Small details make a big difference.”
This is in stark contrast to the rest of the watch industry, where automatic machines produce millions of technically perfect, visually identical watches. But over the past five years, a growing group of collectors have come to support a different approach to watchmaking, one that prioritises individualism and independent makers.
“For many years in auction, we've always said, 'You have Patek Philippe and Rolex. What's the third brand?'” says Alexandre Ghotbi, vice chairman of Phillips auction house, which in late May sold Rexhepi's Chronometer Contemporain I, which retailed for $64,000, for $1.26 million. “Today, the third brand is not a brand, it's the genre of the independent artisan watchmaker,” in a world where watchmakers are more like celebrated artists creating one-of-a-kind pieces than factory workers on an assembly line.
Rexhepi raises his hand from behind his desk to show us a helicopter ascending to the top of a mountain, a metaphor for the different approaches to watchmaking. There are two ways to reach the top of any big mountain. One is a helicopter, a modern machine that whisks you to the top in a flash. The other way, of course, is by foot. It's hard work, but in the end you get to know the route better. And, if you want, you can take a leisurely detour to explore a forest, a stream, or some other beautiful, interesting place. In the process, “you learn something,” Rexhepi says, his voice dropping almost to an earnest whisper. “This is what watchmaking is to me.”
