?Success has many fathers,? the old saying goes, ?while failure is an orphan.? The origins of this aphorism are unclear, but the Parmigiani Toric Hémisphères Rétrograde, which took home the prize for Best Travel Time Watch at the 2017 Grand Prix d?Horlogerie de Genève (GPHG), can certainly be deemed a success, and the ?many fathers? concept is a truism when one considers how the timepiece came to be, and the diverse artisans involved. In this feature from our August 2019 issue, we trace the origins of the watch through each of the five workshops within the Parmigiani Manufacture.
The Parmigiani Toric Hémisphères Rétrograde won the Travel Time Watch prize at GPHG 2017.
We get lots of watches to review here at WatchTime HQ, and we visit a lot of watch factories and ateliers, but it?s very rare that we not only get our hands on a timepiece that won at the Oscars of watchmaking but also have the chance to wear said watch while touring the horological heartland of Switzerland to visit the workshops from which its various elements emerged. That is precisely the opportunity that I had this spring, immediately following Baselworld 2019, when I wore the Toric Hémisphères Rétrograde on a comprehensive tour through all five of the specialized Swiss firms that make up the amalgam known as the Parmigiani Watchmaking Centre ? established by Parmigiani?s parent organization, the Sandoz Family Foundation, in its quest to bring the brand, founded by namesake Michel Parmigiani in 1...