How a watch works

This is the best video I have found to demonstrate how a mechanical watch works (don’t be scared by the title, the video is in English):

I post this for a few reasons.  First, it is shocking how many people who love, buy, sell, write about and talk about watches have no idea how one even works.  While it is not necessary to know how an engine works to love cars, it is at least a nice bonus to have a fundamental knowledge of the subject at hand.

Second, it is refreshing to cut down to the basics and remember how incredible these little micro-machines are.  The simultaneous simplicity and complexity cannot help but excite us.  It seems to hook in to some basic human interest.

And third, look how dated the video seems, and yet the movement is exactly what is produced today.  This is why Contemporary Horology exists.  At the end of the movie a circle is drawn.  All the standard parts jump into their standard places in the standard circle.  Isn’t it great that there are some creators who are thinking outside the circle?