orage is passionate about watchmaking, of course, but members of its team and many of its aficionados are also photographers. This is the case of Horage Marketing Director, Landon Stirling, who has a background in professional photography. From a gear perspective he is very minimalistic, preferring to work with one lens and one camera whenever possible: less is more, as they say, and he wanted to convey this in the Lensman series.

Engineer Markus Lindstedt is himself also a camera aficionado. His first drawings of suggested Lensman watch functions were the catalyst for the series. In early 2021 together with Horage founders Tzuyu Huang and Andreas Felsl, the team started to work bridging the worlds of photography and horology. Friends close to the brand like Horage photographer Kevin Lo caught wind of the project and a seemingly endless stream of ideas began to flow.

Blacked out cameras are a hallmark of professional photographers, especially those taking candid street shots. For the Lensman 1, an aesthetic balance was found between the black dial and titanium case. Over on the back of the case, the movement itself is finished in black PVD to complement the dial.

The result of this creative process is a tribute to Oskar Barnack who designed the first commercial 35mm camerawith a compact, intuitive design, which ushered in the age of modern street photography. For the Lensman 1, whose focal point is naturally the titanium flying tourbillon at 6 o’clock, Horage’s team engineered the K-TOU calibre, which is equally compact: at just 0.29 grams the titanium tourbillon cage is one of the lightest cages in the world. It‘s a marvel of micro-mechanical engineering considering that 34 parts are contained in its thin 3.4mm profile and 11.6mm diameter. Contributing to the cage‘s lightness is the anti-magnetic silicon escape wheel, anchor, and hairspring.

At 41mm in diameter with a slim 10.3mm profile, the Lensman 1’s Grade T5 titanium case is stunningly proportioned. The lug-to-lug distance of 49mm combined with the case dimensions make for a very comfortable fit. Its aesthetic is inspired by a manual focus camera lens. The body is laser etched with the markings of a f/0.95 aperture ring. An f/0.95 lens is rare, and anything under f/1.0 is among the fastest lenses in the world.

Price (pre-order): CHF 8,890

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