IWC Portuguese, Portuguese Chronograph & Portofino Watch Review | SwissWatchExpo

Fresh from the Showcase here at SwissWatchExpo. 
We’re going into another series of IWC.  
Previously, we talked about the Bauhaus design and 
the influence, the German influence on different  
watches, from Glashutte to IWC. And today we’re 
also going to continue that idea along with  
the Portugieser and the Portofino watches. 
Now, previously, I talked about the Ingenieur.  
So these are interesting only because they’re 
very simplistic in nature. And a lot of people get  
bogged down in details about, Oh, what movement 
does the watch have? And this and that. And I just  
don’t do that. And the reason I don’t is because 
I like folks to be interested more in the overall  
design of the watch and the characteristics of 
the watch rather than the movement of the watch.  
Movements are pretty much durable all 
across the board. You’re going to get  
very similar results out of all the movements 
and people get bogged down in a lot of details.
And there’s some really fascinating 
technical details for sure.  
I don’t like to talk about that because that takes 
away from the beauty of the actual watch and the  
body of the watch itself. For example, when 
you look at this particular gold Portofino,  
this watch has one of the most simplistic 
designs within the IWC family. Now it’s a  
40 millimeter watch. Sometimes you can get 
them in 38 millimeter, you can get them  
in various sizes in the Portofino range, but 
the most common of course is the 40 millimeter  

Portofino. Now, this is important because the
design influences a couple of different things.
This is an American stopwatch design.
So the original design of the Portofino
was an American that the American that started
IWC in the 1800s, in the mid 1800s and 1860s.
And he brought the idea of the
pocket watch to Schaffhausen.
And so that’s what they originally
manufactured. Eventually of course men
started wearing wristwatches, but not until
after women started wearing wristwatches
meaning the original watches that men wore
were very, very small in comparison today’s
pieces. So when you see a lot of vintage pieces
that are on men’s wrists in previous like films
and photos and things like that, maybe from
the early 19 hundreds, you’ll notice, wow,
the watches that they were wearing were really
small, especially compared to what people wear
today. Of course, people were just overall smaller
then, too. They weren’t as tall and they weren’t
as large. So a lot of different designs have taken
place throughout the years and watches have just
continued to get larger, but that doesn’t take
away from the elegance of pieces that are smaller.
Now with the IWC, when it became a wristwatch,
basically what they did was they took the idea
of a pocket watch and they welded lugs
on the either end of a pocket watch.
And that’s how they came up with the design. This
is no different. This particular Portofino has,
if you took the lugs away and you turn the watch
on its side, it would look like a pocket watch
without any question, but there’s a little bit
more simplicity that happens because you can
have a lot of intricate details within the
dial. And this watch doesn’t have a whole
lot of intricate details splattered across the
dial. It’s very clean. It’s very simplistic.
It has applied markers. And of course this
watch has solid gold through the case and
the bracelet. That’s also something that you
don’t see very often within the Portofino line.
Typically you see it in stainless steel. So you
have a small complication of the date. That’s very
clear and easy to read, which is important to a
lot of folks, a lot of dates on a lot of watches.
You just might as well, not even have it. And
they’re poorly placed. They there’s, there’s no
symmetry within the dial. This one has the date
very well-placed, it’s very clean. It mixes and
matches what the rest of the dial, if it was
anywhere else, it would look terribly out of
place. The simplicity of the hands. They’re
just simply, they’re not even sword hands
so much as they’re just, they look almost
identical to the stick markers on the dial.
When you get close up to the dial and you
see all the little markers for the hours,
and then you compare them to the hands, they look
very, very similar. So it’s just a lot of symmetry
that goes on in this watch. There’s some, there’s
a lot of symmetry that goes on in that, in that,
mesh style bracelet as well. The rolled links
are all very, very clean and simplistic.
It almost looks like just a regular jewelry
style bracelet. Of course, you can put this
on a strap as well. You can completely change
its look, you can go with a little bit more
casual if this one’s a little bit too flashy,
this one represents an extremely amazing value.
For example, this watch is just $10,000 for all of
this gold. This watch was more than $20,000 new.
So you’re saving an absolute fortune when you buy
a pre-owned watch. And there’s absolutely nothing
about this watch that there’s no dings or dents or
scratches or any of those types of things buying
pre-owned on a piece like this is absolutely
way to go. Now, when you get into the Portuguese
movements, I’m sorry, watches the movements get a
little bit different because they’re complicated.
They have these particular, Portuguese
watches have the chronograph function in them.
And so a lot of watches that have chronograph
functions in them. They have all kinds of things
going on. There’s dials everywhere. There’s
date functions. IWC keeps this one very,
very simplistic because they arrange the two sub
dials at the 12 and the six. And there is no date.
So when you look at this style, they have,
it has applied, numbers, literal numbers,
instead of markers. It doesn’t glow. It’s
not extraordinarily over complicated.
It’s just a simple chronograph. And again, it
goes the idea of being that simplistic German
Bauhaus design, but there’s a lot of other
little details that people may not notice
right away when they’re looking at this watch. For
example, when you look at the side of the case,
the edge of the bezel actually extends out from
the case. That’s not typical on any other watch.
You typically see as the, as the case comes
up, you typically see where the bezel starts
moving in and it sort of squeezes into a round
pattern and meets the crystal inside because
the dial of the watch is actually smaller
than the overall case by a large margin.
There’s a lot of wasted space with this particular
piece. There’s not a lot of wasted space.
You can actually see that, that edge of
that bezel protrude out from the case.
And that’s why when you look at the dial,
even though this is not that large of a watch,
it appears a lot larger just because it takes
up a lot more real estate. There’s this really
interesting chapter ring that goes on the outside,
around the dial as well, which is something that
a lot of chronographs have, but they’re not
usually visible. And unless you point them out,
people wouldn’t even notice them, but on this,
watch it, it pops right out in front of you.
These watches look absolutely
amazing. Now this happens to be
a Laureus Sport for Food watch. And I love these
because when these watches are first purchased,
there’s a donation that goes to the foundation,
Laureus Sport for Good, which goes to children all
around the world that are either underprivileged
or have physical difficulties, that kind of thing.
And maybe they don’t have the community
support that they need to be able to
do sports in an organized fashion, or maybe they
aren’t, that maybe they don’t have the physical
ability to do sports in an organized fashion
like everybody else and their special needs
in terms of their physical requirements. Well,
Laureus Sport for good make sure that they, the
foundation provides for everybody, whether they’re
underprivileged or just physically incapable,
uh, and they need to play sports in a different
way. But this is interesting because they take,
they there’s of all of the
kids that are in the program,
the kids are asked to draw something. And then
from a pile of all of those kids drawings,
one is chosen at random. So that it’s fair.
And then that picture is translated to the
case back of the Laureus Sport for Good
foundation watches, which this one is.
This one happens to have a child sitting
on the ground, playing ball with the dog.
It’s probably the coolest one I’ve
ever seen. I’ve seen a lot of different
versions of the vet case back. This is
by far my favorite when I saw it, uh, it,
I really enjoyed it. So you can get a lot
of really great things from the IWC designs.
Nobody else does that. And this is another
version of that same watch, but you see
how very different they look because of the
colors. They look extraordinarily different,
even though they’re the same watch. So yeah, you
can get a lot of different feel from these pieces.
This one happens to have a silver dial. Now,
the reason that I chose this one is because
it’s very confusing. A lot of people see this
particular watch and they think the dial is white.
It’s actually silver. They also think that
the hands are black because in certain light,
the hands can appear black,
but they see it in pictures
and the hands are intense blue. They’re not
that intense blue, unless you’re in direct,
bright light. Now for this particular, for
what we’re doing here, I don’t know if the,
blue is showing up as well on camera as it does in
person, but this watch looks extraordinarily blue.
All of the applied numbers are blue that matched
the hands. So don’t get discouraged when you see
these watches because the photographs are, this
is a very difficult watch to photograph and even
IWC through its own promotional ads showed this
with a lot brighter hands than it actually has.
I can assure you that they’re clearly
blue in almost every bright light pattern,
but once the lights dim, they do take on a
very dark view and they can almost look black.
So understand that when you
buy this particular Portugieser
you’re going to experience that sort of color
change. Now this is another Portugieser. This is
an interesting hand wound piece. This one has
gold hands and gold applied numbers with the
anthracite sub dial. Obviously, again, it’s a
silver dial, but it can appear white. It can
appear ivory in color. It can even
have a little bit of a gray hue to it,
but this is a hand wound mechanical piece. In
other words, you have to wind it every so often.
It’s got a huge power reserve. So you don’t,
you won’t be doing it as often as other watches.
This one has a few little in the tradition of the
Bauhaus design, a few little sneaky things in it
that if you don’t look closely, you’ll miss them.
For example, the 60 marker on the sub dial is red
and that doesn’t immediately pop out until
you look at it a little bit more closely.
Everything is extraordinarily high polished.
There’s nothing about this watch that doesn’t
stand out, but it’s not overt. It’s not gaudy.
It’s not too rich. It’s just right. And you can
literally wear it with anything. And of course
you can get all the different straps for all
the IWC so you can change their personality at any
time. But once again, that very simplistic German
Bauhaus design pops up in the, in the hand
wound movement in the back. So the case back
of this watch is clear and you can see the
hand wound movement in it. And this is also
a Bauhaus design movement. It’s very simplistic in
nature, but it’s also very complicated in design.
So each one of the decorations on this is
extraordinarily complicated and difficult to
manufacture. However, the way that it’s laid out
in the case back is very simplistic to look at.
It’s very clear what you’re looking at. It’s
aligned symmetrically, there’s just a lot of
really cool things. Now, again, this watch is
designed after a pocket watch movement. So when
you see this watch in this is an advanced design
of something that IWC has been doing for over
a hundred years, and they incorporated a lot of
those movement types into this particular watch.
So when you purchase these Portugiesers,
and by the way, I just want to make clear
the three below the gold watch is the Portofino,
everything else is a Portugieser. So if you have
more questions about what the difference between
the Portofino is, and the Portugieser, please
give us a call, subscribe, ring the bell, email
us. We’ll answer all of your questions about all
the watches that we have. And remember that when
you buy a pre-owned IWC, the value is incredible.
All the watches that we have here are in
flawless condition. They’re always serviced.
There’s no scratches or dings and dents and
things like that that you have to worry about,
and you get an incredible value
in price with these watches.
So give us a call here at SwissWatchExpo,
we’ll be happy to help you get one in here.