Chopard cheap posed a challenge when creating this watch.
It’s the eagle eye, it’s the thrill of flying, challenge your opponents! Excuse the lyrical levity of this moment before we get into the clockwork heroes of our story, but the Survivor writing works really well here. Released only a few years ago in 2019, the Alpine Eagle is a latecomer to the stainless steel sports watch scene. When it did hit the market, Chopard didn’t do anything with this model. Instead, it took up the challenge to create a timepiece that could stand up to the best in Switzerland.
how we got here
The Alpine Eagle is not Chopard’s first foray into the world of integrated bracelet sports watches. As early as 1980, Karl-Friedrich Scheufele, a 22-year-old new member of the Chopard family business, designed the St. Moritz watch.
It has all the sports watch notes common to both the Nautilus and the Royal Oak, with a distinctive bezel, intricate bracelet and slim profile. This is a watch that used to perform well but the tune eventually ended. Young Karl-Fredrich’s father was proud of his design and would continue to wear it to work when his grandson Karl-Fritz happened to come across the buy luxury replica watches one day. He exclaimed, “This is the watch we should be making today!” He was right.
Chopard since St. Moritz
St. Moritz was the inspiration, but Chopard in 1980 was not the same as Chopard today. In the intervening decades, Karl-Fredrich has pushed its watchmaking to be as in-house as possible as early as the early 1990s, long before the practice became popular. The result is a movement-making factory that can design, produce and finish movements to a standard that few can match. Chopard also has its own foundry, is able to produce its own gold and steel, and focuses on ethical sourcing and sustainability.
watch
The first thing anyone notices about a stainless steel sports watch is the steel. Chopard manufactures its own steel for the Alpine Eagle, called A223 Lucent Steel. Consisting of 70% recycled steel, with the remainder mined near European countries to reduce the carbon footprint, it offers some advantages over the typical 316L steel used by most of the watch industry. Lucent Steel is less corrosive, more reflective, and most importantly. Harder than 316L, making it 50% more resistant to scratches and abrasions. This special steel might not be obvious at first, but it’s reassuring if you own one of these bad boys.
Watch bracelets take up the most space on your wrist, yet many people treat them as an afterthought. Chopard is going in the exact opposite direction, focusing on every facet of the bracelet. The sides are brushed vertically to add visual weight to the thinner side of the bracelet. At the top, the brushed links are polished on each side and between each other, and the center section is fully polished and slightly raised. The bracelet tapers for comfort and ends with a hidden clasp that simply says “Chopard” to let you know where to open it.
The Discount replica watches itself is balanced by two sets of notches on either side. The right side serves as a small crown guard, while the left side is just visual balance. The brushed bezel features practical mirror-polished screws, all of which outline the highlight: the dial.
The etched stripes on the dial are not quite the traditional sunburst pattern. It’s deep and wide, with slight curves in every line. This dial is where the Alpine Eagle gets its name because it looks like an eagle’s iris. It’s certainly more abstract than it sounds, though the result will keep you staring at the dial for years to come. Applied markings use Roman numerals at the quarters and hourly markings. The hands seem to float over the dial because their polish contrasts so strongly with the texture that it looks more like part of the companion phone than tethered to the Hawkeye.
inside the watch
The 41mm Alpine Eagle gets the internal 01-01-C. Designed and produced in its own manufacturing facility, this movement is COSC (Observatory) certified and spares no expense in setting a ruby set with 31 jewels. A 60-hour power reserve keeps everything running, giving you plenty of time to take the watch off so you can turn it over and admire the movement’s polished edges and Côtes de Genève through the display case back.
The 36mm Alpine Eagle is powered by the 09.01-C, a movement similar to its big brother but with 27 jewels set inside, but slightly fewer. COSC certification and a 42-hour power reserve will keep you on time, unless you can’t appreciate this equally well-crafted movement.
Chopard is finally late to the sports watch party in style. While others produced watches decades ago with little change over time, Chopard has used this time to improve its own watchmaking. It created facilities, hired engineers and trained watchmakers, all to be able to deliver a watch in the future that is not too different from the past. Chopard is on the rise, back on the streets, seize the moment, seize the opportunity. The result is that the Alpine Eagle is a watch that is always ready to take on the competition.
