September 16, 2026Independent Watch Journalism Since 2006Newsletter  |  Search
Knockoff Watches Wholesale Collectors Club Free membership · the weekly watch brief, release alerts and invitations Join ›
Knockoff Watches Wholesale  ›  News  ›  Throwback Thursday: Urwerk UR-103
News

Throwback Thursday: Urwerk UR-103

It's #ThrowbackThursday! Today we're looking at the original Urwerk UR-103...

Throwback Thursday: Urwerk UR-103
Screen shot 2013-07-11 at 11.06.08 AM
The original Urwerk UR-103, introduced in 2003.

The basic idea for the original UR-103 was to reinvent the way we tell time, and it kickstarted a whole new generation of wildly inventive, postmodern timepiece designs. Urwerk’s founders, master watchmaker Felix Baumgartner and artist-designer Martin Frei, presented their new invention for the first time at Baselworld 2003, where it created awe and scandal. There were no hands. It tracked the hours via four orbiting satellites, and minutes on a retrograde index, a far cry from the traditional heritage watches of the Jura. The first version had a cover over the satellite arms, but models that immediately followed had a crystal that showed off the intriguing mechanism. It went quickly from scandal to game-changer, influencing timepiece design for the next decade. Original Urwerk 103

The Haute Minute

It's #ThrowbackThursday! Today we're looking at the original Urwerk UR-103...

Carol Besler
Carol Besler
Knockoff Watches Wholesale
Author biography not yet filled in on the WordPress profile - needed for author credibility (E-E-A-T) and for the Person entity in our schema.
Knockoff Watches Wholesale Collectors Club

The watch brief, every week. Free.

New references, auction results and the stories behind them — written for collectors, sent once a week.

Become a member
Knockoff Watches Wholesale · Collectors Club · Masthead · Editorial Standards · Advertise · Privacy · Terms