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Ulysse Nardin Launches Freak One Ops 

Ulysse Nardin dresses its Freak One in khaki and black to unveil the Freak One Ops, a military styled version of its groundbreaking flying carrousel movement watch.

The new Ulysse Nardin Freak One Ops.

This newest Freak retains the same specifications and black DLC case of the Freak One that the watchmaker debuted earlier in 2023. That watch (recently named winner of the Iconic Watch Prize at the 2023 GPHG) combined several favorite Freak designs from the past. These include the notched bezel of the original 2001 Freak, the open gear train seen on the 2013 Freak Cruiser, plus the high-legibility of the 2018 Freak Vision.

Here, Ulysse Nardin offers a more casual version of the earlier design. Instead of the earlier watch’s luxurious gold-finished bezel and movement we see a carbon bezel, a khaki green palette and a sunray patterned barrel cover, creating a stealthier version of the watch.

As noted, the 44mm Freak One Ops maintains all the Freak One’s ‘no hands, no dial and no crown’ technical features, anchored by the highly-visible UN-240 self-winding movement with a 90-hour power reserve.

The movement’s flying carousel, silicon balance wheel and escapement are suspended by a bridge that acts as the minute hand while the second bridge serves as the hour hand.

The Freak One Ops is regulated by a silicon hairspring (which Ulysse Nardin introduced in 2008) with an escapement treated with the synthetic diamond and silicon plasma treatment called DIAMonSIL, which Ulysse Nardin added to the Freak in 2007.

Ulysse Nardin offers the Freak One Ops with a choice of two integrated straps: one in black and khaki “ballistic” rubber, and an alternate two-tone recycled-rubber strap, also in black and khaki. Both have black DLC titanium and black ceramic folding clasps.

Price: $66,500.

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Girard-Perregaux and Aston Martin Launch Neo Bridges Edition

By Elizabeth Doerr 

As part of the partnership with luxury carmaker Aston Martin since 2021, Girard-Perregaux reveals a second co-creation from its quintessential Bridges collection. This line pays tribute to company cofounder Constant Girard, who was one of the very few watchmakers of the nineteenth century able to make a tourbillon; his special trio of visible bridges continues to be the focal point of the wristwatches in this collection to this day. 

 

The new Girard-Perregaux Neo Bridges Aston Martin Edition.

In 2014, Girard-Perregaux presented a radically modern evolution of the Three Bridges called the Neo Tourbillon with Three Bridges featuring changes that endowed the new sub-line with a much more avant-garde spirit thanks to the shape and material of the bridges, the crystal, and the redesigned caliber. 

The bridges, now made of titanium instead of gold, were redesigned to provide extra three-dimensionality and visually lightened the appearance of what is essentially a rather large watch (45mm x 12.18 mm). They also add sleek modernity. 

For this latest iteration – the fifth co-branded timepiece overall – the team comprising designers from both companies was inspired by the world’s first Super Tourer, the Aston Martin DB12. 

Rather unusually, though, the watch features an inverted movement: the symmetrically designed Caliber GP0840000-2164 therefore visibly relocates components usually found at the rear of the watch to the front, including the micro rotor for automatic winding at 1:30 and the mainspring barrel across from it at 11:30, whose looks are motivated by the brakes found behind the Aston Martin DB12’s spoked wheels. 

Two PVD-coated “neo” bridges in Aston Martin Green not only hold the balance wheel and gear train in place, but, along with the minute markers and strap seams, provide color splashes against the resolutely modern blacks and greys of this watch. The effect is striking.

Girard-Perregaux darkens the new watch’s 45mm titanium case with DLC and builds a skeletonized movement decorated with the green hue associated with Aston Martin. The hands and markers both glow with green SuperLuminova to match the metallic Aston Martin Green bridges that dominate the dial.

Look for additional green tints in the black rubber strap (with a fabric effect), which is enlivened with green stitches and then fitted with a titanium DLC triple folding buckle.

Girard-Perregaux will offer the Neo Bridges Aston Martin Edition as a limited edition of 250 pieces.

Price: $37,700. 

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Oris Adds Laser-Cut Dial to ProPilot X Calibre 400

Oris introduces a version of its ProPilot X Calibre 400 with an unusual, colorful laser-cut dial produced using a technique new to watchmaking.

The new Oris ProPilot X Calibre 400 Laser.

The titanium dial, created with the assistance of ETH Zürich university, shimmers with color changes, appearing to change from blue to green to violet to echo the colors seen on iridescent beetles.

 

Based on the principles of biomimicry, the phenomenon is a natural one called ‘optical interference.’ This means that red light waves are destroyed, while blue and green waves are reflected.

There is no color pigment on the dial.  

While the eye sees colors, there is not one drop of color pigment on watch’s dial. The surface instead splits the light into its components to create the visible rainbow effect.

The entire dial is laser cut. Oris and engineering students at ETH Zurich created the logo, indexes, minutes track and dial text using another laser process that creates a three-dimensional effect.

 

In addition to the spectacular dial, the watch retains the familiar components and specifications found on the ProPilot X Calibre 400, which Oris debuted in 2022. These include a 39mm titanium case, titanium bezel and crown and a three-link titanium bracelet.

 

Oris fits its superb Calibre 400 inside the watch, offering chronometric accuracy, high levels of anti-magnetism and a ten-year warranty with ten-year recommended service intervals.

Price: $5,200. 

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Hublot’s Newest Sapphire Smile 

Hublot deepens its partnership with artist Takashi Murakami as its creates the MP 15 Takashi Murakami Tourbillon Sapphire, a dramatic new limited edition central flying tourbillon watch with a clear sapphire case, dial and crown.

The new Hublot MP 15 Takashi Murakami Tourbillon Sapphire.

The watch maintains Murakami’s well-known flower and smile-face motif, which Hublot and the artist have developed for previous special models, but enhances the focus here to clear sapphire.

Also central to the design is Hublot’s central flying tourbillon, a first for the watchmaker set within a series-produced model. The fully skeletonized movement, exposed without an upper bridge, appears to float in space.

In place of a traditional dial, Murakami places twelve clear sapphire flower petals that frame the tourbillon, onto which Hublot adds two titanium eyes and a broad titanium smile. Two small hands rotate, unusually, under the tourbillon cage, with their tips indicating hours and minutes.

In order to create this rare configuration, Hublot watchmakers pivoted the cannon pinion and the hour wheel around the tourbillon support, creating a co-axial construction.

Hublot tops the black-plated hands with SuperLuminova for thrilling night-time visibility.

The central flying tourbillon is also quite unusual— and technically interesting. With an impressive power reserve of 150 hours, the tourbillon can be fully wound via a supplied stylus. Rechargeable using a USB socket, the stylus is placed on the crown and winds it through 100 revolutions. The wearer can also wind the watch using the crown.

The Hublot MP 15 Takashi Murakami Tourbillon Sapphire is surprisingly modest in size (42mm by 13.4mm) and arrives on an integrated rubber strap. The watch will be made as limited edition model of fifty pieces.

Price: $316,000. 

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Greubel Forsey Debuts 8th Fundamental Invention 

 

Greubel Forsey redesigns its tourbillon to create the new titanium-cased Tourbillon Cardan, the watchmaker’s 8th Fundamental Invention and the latest in the series of patented, technically advanced timepieces. And while the oscillator here echoes the airy appearance of a traditional flying tourbillon, Greubel Forsey’s version is anything but classical.

The new Greubel Forsey Tourbillon Cardan.

Rather than the usual sixty-second rotation, the tourbillon here rotates once every sixteen seconds. In addition, the balance wheel is larger than usual (12.6mm), which tends to optimize its oscillations.

Greubel Forsey explains that not only do these two factors enhance chronometric precision, the tourbillon’s high inertia also makes it less sensitive to shocks and variations in speed.

Greubel Forsey combines this larger, faster tourbillon with a revolving 30 degree angle and two constantly tilting rings that guide the tourbillon, tilting backward and forward in forty-eight seconds. Though this movement may recall the use of gimbals in some marine chronometers, the new design is just a bit more complicated.

Greubel Forsey explains that in this new watch, the tilt of the rings is controlled with a range of +30° to -30°, which, when combined with the inclined tourbillon, offers a “better ratio of angular velocity to chronometric performance.”

With four stacked barrels, the Tourbillon Cardan offers an impressive eighty hours of highly chronometric power reserve.

Greubel Forsey showcases its new tourbillon within a 45.5mm titanium case with a domed sapphire crystal, which allows for a full view of the large balance wheel and swaying dual rings.

And of course Greubel Forsey hand-finishes each component of the Tourbillon Cardan.  Many of the finishing procedures here are unique to the watch, including the frosted titanium finish on the tourbillon cage and the large polished flank finishes above the titanium mainplate. (See the Greubel Forsey website for a full list of specifications.) 

Greubel Forsey plans to build about eleven Tourbillon Cardan watches annually, with a total output of fifty-five watches during the next five years. 

Price: $534,000.

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