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Franck Muller’s USA Limited Edition Bill Auberlen Vanguard Races to Stores

The seconds indicator on the new Franck Muller USA limited edition Vanguard Racing Skeleton Bill Auberlen starts with double zero at the bottom of the dial, not at the top. This layout, while rare on a watch dial, allows seconds to be read from both ends of the seconds hand and echoes the dashboard Auberlen would see while piloting his racecar.

Vanguard Racing Skeleton USA Limited Edition, here cased in the Technologie Bleu composite.

The dial layout is just one of many racer-friendly details that Franck Muller built into the sporty automatic watch, which was announced earlier this year and is reaching Franck Muller boutiques and its U.S. retailers now.

Another example can be found in Franck Muller’s choice of case materials for the tonneau-shaped 44mm by 53.7mm Vanguard watch.

The watch is the latest Franck Muller model built with Auberlen’s direct input. One of America’s most successful racecar drivers, the BMW racing driver Auberlen has won sixty-three races.

Three versions

One version of the watch is built with carbon, the same ultra-light, high-performance material racecar makers utilize. Another version features an unusual blue-tinged high-tech composite called Technologie Bleu, which the watchmaker says is created by mixing ‘high purity metals and other exotic elements.’

This non-conductive, non-metallic material is made using a process called the Micelle Phenomenon. Once the case is formed, Franck Muller cuts, carves, grinds and sands the material to a durable, gem-quality finish.

Additional sporty touches on the Vanguard Racing Skeleton Bill Auberlen include a generous use of racing red dial details across the skeletonized dial. The watchmakers at Franck Muller also attach a strap composed of Alcantara-like suede, reminiscent of a sports car interior, and lined with rubber. Instead of attaching the strap to the case using the usual spring bar technique, Franck Muller subtly integrates the strap into the case with two invisible screws.

In another unusual detail, Franck Muller has skeletonized the numerals visible on the date wheel to match the open-worked dial.

Franck Muller offers its Vanguard Racing Skeleton Bill Auberlen in three case materials: rose gold ($34,000), carbon ($27,400) and macro molecular Technologie Bleu ($26,200).

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Franck Muller Poses New Gem-Set Mysteries

Any visitor to Franck Muller’s vast headquarters in Genthod, adjacent to Geneva, will vouch for the technical depth this manufacture exhibits throughout the facility. Case after case of watches set with tourbillons and multiple complications testify to decades of watchmaking with a distinctive style, typically built into the brand’s trademark Cintrée Curvex-shaped case.

But there’s much more to Franck Muller than its range of Master Bankers, large tourbillons and jaw-dropping skeleton models. Few watchmakers can match the wide-ranging fluency the brand also demonstrates year after year with its gem-set collections.

Two examples of the new Franck Muller Double Mystery Peony.

Franck Muller has again paired its technical chops with its gem-setting expertise with the release of the new Double Mystery Peony, which combines gemstone setting and its enchanting Double Mystery time display system.

In the Double Mystery collection, Franck Muller replaces watch hands with two rotating discs, each with an arrow-shaped indicator. Patented in 1998, the technique allows Franck Muller to experiment by setting a colorful spectrum of gemstones across and atop of the two rotating discs.

In this latest Double Mystery Peony, Franck Muller sets 662 diamonds and colored gemstones (4.87 carats) on each dial, all shaped and patterned across the dial to recall the namesake bloom. The watches, powered by an automatic movement topped with the Double Mystery complication, are offered in white gold and yellow gold and in 42mm and 39mm cases. Price: $88,700

 

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Franck Muller Adds Bracelets to Vanguard

Franck Muller now offers metal bracelet options for the first time for its top-selling Vanguard collection.

The tonneau-shaped Vanguard collection, which includes a wide range of the Geneva watchmaker’s primarily sporty models on leather or textile straps, can now be attached to the wrist with a bracelet composed and finished with either brushed steel, polished steel, brushed titanium and black brushed titanium.

Franck Muller will make the polished and brushed link bracelets to fit into the two different Vanguard case sizes, 41 mm and 45mm.

The firm’s technicians have also developed a fine adjustment system that allow the bracelet to be sized to fit proportionally and ‘perfectly’ on the wrist, according to Franck Muller. Links can be quickly removed or added to lengthen or shorten the bracelet.

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Franck Muller Diver Takes Familiar Shape

The new Franck Muller Skafander integrates a diving theme with a tonneau-shaped case – a combination rarely seen among marine-focused watch designs. Because divers require a unidirectional rotating bezel to assess correct dive time, watches for divers typically utilize a round case built with a round bezel.

Two examples of the new Franck Muller Skafander.

Here, Franck Muller has devised a functional round diver’s bezel, but has placed it inside the Skafander’s large tonneau case, a shape deeply familiar to aficionados of this iconoclastic independent watchmaker. Once set and locked, the Skafander’s dive time is secured with a clearly labeled lock, which insures that the bezel won’t be accidently altered.

While not an officially certified dive watch, the Skafander will retain its water resistance to 100 meters, which allows wearers full, worry-free use while at the beach, boating – or in the pool.

Franck Muller offers the Skafander in a range of case metals, including titanium, steel and rose gold, all with a semi-skeletonized dial that allows a view into the automatic movement below.

Skippers might prefer the highly visible titanium-cased models with blue or yellow accents, or even the blue-accented watch cased in steel. We suspect the boat’s owner, however, might opt to the ritzier rose gold model.  

Price:  CHF 14,800 (about $16,100, for titanium models only).

 

Specifications: Franck Muller Skafander (titanium case edition)

Case: 46mm x 57mm x 15.60mm titanium with black PVD treatment. Water resistant to 100 meters.

Movement: Automatic, offering 42 hours power reserve.

Dial: Unidirectional internal rotating bezel indicating the diving time. Half-openwork movement in the center.

Strap: Blue rubber. More colors available with steel and gold models.

 

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Franck Muller Launches Curvex with Central Tourbillon

For its new Grand Central Cintree Curvex, Franck Muller watchmakers found an innovative way to place the hour and second hands around the tourbillon cage, highlighting the large central tourbillon and a stunning guilloché dial.

The new Franck Muller Grand Central Cintrée Curvex, available in a variety of dial colors and case metal options.

That tourbillon (while large, the tourbillon here is not the brand’s largest) is housed in a redesigned Cintrée Curvex case with a separate bezel, allowing the crystal to reach the strap. Furthermore, Franck Muller has separated the bezel from the case, allowing for a series of impressive two-tone treatments.

This design totally changes the aspect of the original Cintrée Curvex and fully highlights the curves of this newly shaped watch.

And, in an unusual move, Franck Muller powers the new Grand Central Cintrée Curvex with an automatic movement. Many traditional tourbillon watches rely on manual-wind calibers.

The watch’s caliber (FM CX 40T-CTR) is visible through the sapphire caseback, showing the traditional decorations, including Côte de Genève and sunray brushing.

Franck Muller wisely allows a clear view of the caliber (FM CX 40T-CTR) through a sapphire caseback, showing the traditional decorations, including Côte de Genève and sunray brushing. Prices: From $124,400 to $134,400.

Specifications: Franck Muller Grand Central Cintrée Curvex

Case: 58.70mm x 40.16 mm x 7.73 mm (various metals) with stainless steel internal bezel. Sapphire crystal. Water resistant up to 30 meters. Functions: Hours, minutes and seconds on the central tourbillon.

Dial: Stamped guilloché
, 20 layers of translucent lacquer (various colors), hand-applied Arabic numerals. 

Movement: FM CX 40T-CTR 
Self-winding mechanical movement with bidirectional rotor system. Power reserve is 4 days. Balance wheel frequency set at 18,000 alternations per hour.

Décor: Côte de Genève on bridges,
sunray brushing on the rotor and barrel cover,
spotting on the bottom plate.
Chamfering on the bridges and rotor board. 
Rhodium plating and 24-kt. gold finish on textual engravings.

Bracelet: Hand-sewn alligator strap with gold folding buckle.

Prices: From $124,400 to $134,400.

 

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