Ulysse Nardin gives its pioneering anchor tourbillon escapement a suitably futuristic home at last

By Chris Hall

This is the Ulysse Nardin Executive Tourbillon “Free Wheel”. It’s the latest outing for Ulysse Nardin’s high-tech tourbillon, and this time the rest of the watch is equally advanced. The standout feature, as you will no doubt have spotted, is the absence of a dial – but this goes further than a simple open-worked design. Ulysse Nardin has effectively dropped the dial through the watch to reveal most, but crucially not all, of the movement, giving the impression that the tourbillon escapement, gear train, mainspring barrel and power reserve indicator are floating somewhat separately from each other. Hence, “Free Wheel”. 
What this means in effect is that Ulysse Nardin has decorated the top of the mainplate (as we look at it; to a watchmaker, it’s the bottom) and done away with traditional bridges to hold the aforementioned elements above it – instead, we have some very modern looking chevron-shaped bridges for the tourbillon at six o’clock, the power reserve indicator at four o’clock and the third wheel of the gear train at around eight o’clock. They’re echoed by the openworked form of the barrel, and add considerably to the whole watch’s space-age aesthetic (something not dissimilar from modern-day Angelus). The keyless winding works – never the most attractive ...