Watches

A New Book About Bulova Is Out Now

WatchesApr 05, 2018

A New Book About Bulova Is Out Now

It is 176 pages and outlines the company’s firsts in watchmaking, marketing and more.

20180405_Bulova-header.jpg
A new book on watch brand Bulova, called “A History of Firsts,” came out earlier this week. The 176-page hardback book retails for $175.

New York--There’s a new book out about 143-year-old watch brand Bulova, and it focuses on the company’s milestones in watchmaking, marketing and more.

“Bulova: A History of Firsts” went on sale earlier this week.

The book starts during the Gilded Age—industrialist Joseph Bulova started the company in 1875—and continues through present-day New York City, where the now Citizen-owned company is headquartered.

Bulova introduced the first electronic watch that enjoyed widespread success, the Accutron, in 1960, and quite a few years later, the first curved chronograph movement in men’s watches in 2016 and then women’s watches in 2017.

The watch brand also included among its firsts in the book its support of the feminist movement, pointing to its “Equal Pay. Equal Time.” ad (pictured below) that ran in the 1970s when, much like today, the gender pay gap was the subject of much discussion amid another push for passage of the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), which remains unadopted to this day.

The 176-page hardcover book has eight chapters, each written by a different author including style writers David Coggins, Matthew Hranek and Kate Betts; legendary musician Nile Rodgers; advertising journalist Stuart Elliott; and longtime watch writer and current Hodinkee Editor-in-Chief Jack Forster.

Aaron Sigmond, who has authored six books on watches and written about timepieces for Esquire and Time Inc., edited the book.

“Bulova: A History of Firsts” went on sale April 2 on Bulova.com, Amazon.com, as well as at Assouline boutiques worldwide, including at The Plaza hotel in New York. It retails for $175.

New York-based publisher Assouline has come out with a number of jewelry books over the years, including one about Temple St. Clair published last year, 2016’s “The Pearl Necklace,” and the series on French jewelry house Chaumet.

The publication of the Bulova book sprung from a project the brand undertook in recent years to dig through its past and document its history.

This deep dive resulted in the launch of the new Archive series, which includes the Chronograph C, a watch introduced at Baselworld last year that’s based on the timepiece Bulova submitted to NASA in the “space race.” (The Chronograph C ultimately lost out to Omega’s Speedmaster in the competition to become the official watch of the astronauts.)

In addition, plans were announced for the opening of a Bulova museum last year, though they are currently are on hold, the brand said at Baselworld this year.
Michelle Graffis the editor-in-chief at National Jeweler, directing the publication’s coverage both online and in print.

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