Konstantin Chaykin's jubilee year was marked by a personal exhibition and the creation of the Stargazer, the most complicated wristwatch of his career, with 17 complications.
Konstantin Chaykin, watchmaker and inventor, member of the Académie Horlogère des Créateurs Indépendants (AHCI), and winner of the Grand Prix d'Horlogerie de Genève, celebrated the 20th anniversary of his own manufacture in 2023. The watchmaker deems that the company was founded on October 23, 2003. It was on that day that he started working on his first movement. It was a table clock with a tourbillon, and the first tourbillon produced in Russia for 175 years. Today, Konstantin Chaykin is an internationally recognized brand, and the watchmaker is one of the most prolific inventors in his field. For his achievements in 2021, he was awarded the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) gold medal, and in 2022, he was inducted into the Temporis International Awards Hall of Fame.
At the exhibition entitled Konstantin Chaykin: Watchmaker, Inventor, Artist, master showcased the best of his work over the last 20 years .Each of the 25 exhibits displayed in the Museum of Timekeeping represented a milestone in the history of Konstantin Chaykin's watch company, and together, they made up a complete retrospective of his works. Each Chaykin masterpiece represents a symbiosis of complex technical calculations, engineering solutions and ingenious design.
he Lunokhod wristwatch has the largest 3D moonphase indicator in the world, the Cinema features a built-in mechanical movie projector, whilst the Carpe Diem is distinguished by a minute indication in the shape of an hourglass.
Models of the Martian cycle make it possible to determine the time on the Red Planet and the location of the Earth and Mars relative to each other.
Еhe table clock Moscow Computus Clock (27 complications, 2,506 parts, 4 dials) automatically calculates the calendar date of Orthodox Easter. The watchmaker became world famous for his Wristmons (wrist + monster), first released in 2017. More than ten different models with anthropomorphic dials and his signature joker time indication were on display.
It was in this collection of 2023 that Chaykin created the most complicated wristwatch of his career, the Stargazer, featuring 17 complications and a movement consisting of 664 parts.
For the first time ever, the Stargazer watch combines two anthropomorphic dials. One of them is a regulator dial indicating the hours and minutes of mean solar time. It also features 10 complications, including a retrograde day of the week indicator, a planisphere of the Northern Hemisphere, and an indicator of the equation of time.
The second dial displays astronomical functions, including two world premieres – the world's first discrete moonphase indicator, and sunrise and sunset azimuth indicators.
While working on this one-of-a-kind timepiece, Konstantin focused on the idea of creating the most complicated movement possible:"This year marks the 20th anniversary of the founding of the manufactory, and it was important for me to mark this occasion by combining the 3 main areas of my creativity: ultra-complex watch mechanics, anthropomorphic design, and the theme of space conquest". These are the three areas on which the Konstantin Chaykin Manufacture is focused.
The honored inventor of Russia has 96 officially registered patents, which is a record in the global watch industry. About a third of these inventions are astronomical complications. Space exploration is an important part of Chaykin's research program. It started in 2011 with the launch of the Lunokhod watch, continued in 2018 with the Mars Conqueror series of Martian watches, and in 2021 the Space Conqueror model took off for the International Space Station.
Stargazer is the latest entry in the Wristmons collection. Since 2017, when the Joker watch premiered, the collection has grown to include more than 25 characters that vary in design and complication. These include the Dracula, Minotaur, Minions, and Harley Quinn, the collection's only female character. In 2018, the Clown was awarded the Audacity prize at the Grand Prix d'Horlogerie de Genève. In 2023, several new characters were introduced into the collection – Smilodon, which joined Konstantin Chaykin's bestiary series, and the Kolobok, the first character based on a Russian fairy tale, which was unveiled at the Historical Museum in Moscow.
The international premiere of Stargazer took place at Dubai Watch Week in November 2023, and the watch received the prestigious Best Astronomical Complication award (Revo Awards).
