70s LeCoultre Memovox: The Legendary Alarm Watch Gets Funky!

Parent Category: Content

By Adrian Hailwood

Thursday, 19 July 2012 13:02

Jaeger LeCoultre’s iconic alarm watch has been with us since 1956 and for most of its life has worn quite sensible clothes, being either a classical dress watch or a chunkier, sporty piece as fashions have changed.

There was a time when the Memovox let itself go a little crazy. In the US in 1970 LeCoultre advertised this Memovox HPG model. The HPG was a written ‘high precision guarantee’ that came with the watch, indicating the fact that the movement was a high beat 916 running at 28 800 vph rather than the previous 18 000 or 19 800.

Technical aspects aside, the LeCoultre models were cased in the USA to avoid excessive import charges and US tastes were a little more ….. adventurous than those of Switzerland. New Yorkers were listening to The Jackson 5, Sly & the Family Stone and James Brown, and possibly wearing something like this if they had the cash. The sunburst brown dial with block markers demands to be worn with velvet, paisley or corduroy… or all three!

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