Close-Up: Blancpain Villeret Tourbillon Volante Heure Sautante Minute Retrograde
Blancpain caught the lion’s share of its Baselworld 2018 buzz for the new complications in its retro-look Fifty Fathoms Bathyscaphe collection, and rightfully so. However, not to be overlooked is its latest foray into the highest levels of haute horlogerie in its classically elegant Villeret collection ? a timepiece which also contains a couple of firsts for the venerable Le Brassus-based watch manufacture.
Blancpain Villeret Tourbillon Volant Heure Sautante Minute Retrograde
The Blancpain Villeret Tourbillon Volant Heure Sautante Minute Rétrograde represents not only one of the longest model names we’ve typed in our post-Baselworld coverage this year; it’s also a reinterpretation of the brand’s groundbreaking flying tourbillon watch ? an industry first when it was launched in 1989 ? with two new complications used for the very first time in this collection. In this model, which comes in a double-stepped 42-mm rose gold case, the view of the tourbillon cage, already unobstructed by the upper bridge used in traditional (i.e., non-flying) tourbillon construction is even fully in view, as Blancpain has removed the lower bridge and replaced it with a clear sapphire disk. The visual effect makes it appear as though the balance wheel and escapement inside the tourbillon cage are floating in space. The flying tourbillon aperture balances out the large retrograde minutes subdial.
As if this were not revolutionary enough, Blancpain has also added, for the fi...
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