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Geneva Watch Days: The Most Exciting New Timepieces

Brands big and small gathered to showcase new wares, with record-breaking slim movements and bold new designs.  

Geneva Watch Days: The Most Exciting New Timepieces
(Photographer: Diode SA - Denis Hayoun)  

In a normal year, Switzerland’s watchmaking capitals would have already hosted at least two large wristwatch-industry trade fairs—one in Basel, the other in Geneva. Of course, 2020 has been anything but normal, and the luxury watch industry, like most every other industry, has been taking a remote and mostly digital approach to the year’s product launches. This week, however, a small coterie of watchmakers, from power players to plucky indies, pooled their efforts to present Geneva Watch Days, a coordinated exhibition held throughout several hotels in the Swiss capital. Here are seven standout timepieces from the participating brands.

Breitling Endurance Pro

Geneva Watch Days: The Most Exciting New Timepieces

Breitling has been mining its archives for inspiration in recent years, and for the new Endurance Pro athleisure models it unearthed a largely forgotten favorite from the 1970s, the Breitling Sprint. How ’70s is the new model? It’s even got a quartz movement—not the standard quartz of the original Sprint, but Breitling’s own thermocompensated SuperQuartz caliber, which is 10 times more accurate. The case material is also a significant upgrade from the 1970s models’ resin: Breitling’s proprietary Breitlight polymer, which is four times lighter than titanium but significantly stronger. These triathlon-ready chronographs feature compass bezels, pulsometer scales, and a groovy array of ’70s colors. Price: $3,000; breitling.com

Bulgari Octo Finissimo Tourbillon Chronograph Skeleton Automatic

Geneva Watch Days: The Most Exciting New Timepieces

Bulgari, the “Roman Jeweller of Time,” has gone all-in on ultrathin, shattering slenderness records for both watchcases and movements with its Octo Finissimo collection. The latest is the Octo Finissimo Tourbillon Chronograph Skeleton Automatic, which at a startling 7.4 millimeters is the thinnest timepiece to feature automatic winding, a tourbillon, a monopusher chronograph, and a skeletonized movement. Its sandblasted titanium case, 42mm in diameter, mounted on an articulated bracelet of the same material, ensures that it’s lightweight on the wrist as well. Its skeleton dial, with solid subdials at 3 and 9 o’clock and a tourbillon cage at 6, sports a sleek gray finishing. Price: $142,000; bulgari.com

Carl F. Bucherer Manero Flyback

Geneva Watch Days: The Most Exciting New Timepieces

Retro-look chronographs and blue colorways persist as hot trends in the watch world, and Carl F. Bucherer provides both with the new “horizon-colored” edition of its Manero Flyback. Housed in a contemporary 43mm steel case with mushroom-style pushers, the watch’s two-register chronograph dial is bordered by an old-school racing-inspired tachymeter scale. The self-winding movement is an ETA 7750 (a very popular mechanical chronograph movement) souped up with a module from La Joux-Perret that adds a flyback function to the integrated stopwatch. The combination enables multiple time measurements in quick succession, since both chronograph hands can be reset to zero while the stopwatch is still running. Price: $6,200; carl-f-bucherer.com

De Bethune DB28 Steel Wheels Sapphire Tourbillon

Geneva Watch Days: The Most Exciting New Timepieces

De Bethune copped the top prize at the 2011 Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Geneve—watchmaking’s Oscars—with its first DB28, noteworthy for its uniquely shaped case, pocket watch–inspired 12 o’clock crown, and patented floating lugs. The openworked Steel Wheels version, with exposed mainspring barrels and gear train, followed in 2018, and this year’s Steel Wheels Sapphire Tourbillon adds new levels of complexity and clarity. Its signature delta-shaped bridge and two barrel covers are made, for the first time, from pure sapphire—blue for the former, clear for the latter, lending a striking stained-glass effect to the movement and its titanium-silicon tourbillon, which at 0.18 grams is the world’s lightest. Price upon request; debethune.ch

Girard-Perregaux Free Bridge Infinity

Geneva Watch Days: The Most Exciting New Timepieces

Girard-Perregaux created its defining horological invention, a tourbillon caliber with three arrow-shaped bridges, in 1867 and has been riffing on it for its modern collections ever since. The Free Bridge Infinity is the latest, putting a contemporary, modern architectural spin on the 19th century design. Its arrow-shaped “Neo Bridge” spans the base plate of the in-house Caliber GP01800-1170, which also uses low-friction silicon for the escapement and balance wheel, reducing wear and energy consumption. Many of these components are on display dial-side, through a large aperture between 6 and 12 o’clock. A limited edition of 88 pieces, the Infinity uses black DLC-coated steel for its case and 18-karat rose gold for the hour markers and the caliber’s rotor. Price: $20,800; girard-perregaux.com

H. Moser & Cie. Streamliner Centre Seconds

Geneva Watch Days: The Most Exciting New Timepieces

Named for the high-speed trains that dominated early 20th century travel, and defined by those trains’ fluid, rounded curves, the first H. Moser & Cie. Streamliner was a bold departure for the watchmaker known for its sober minimalism. It was the first automatic flyback chronograph with a central display—i.e., no subdials—that the watch industry had ever produced. The new Centre Seconds version expands the family and boils it down to the austere simplicity for which Moser is known. In a 40mm steel case on an ergonomic steel bracelet, the watch displays just the essentials—hour, minute, central seconds—and does so on a fumé dial in Matrix Green, whose tones range from olive green to gold. Price: $21,900; h-moser.com

Ulysse Nardin Blast 

Geneva Watch Days: The Most Exciting New Timepieces

Ulysse Nardin’s forays into skeletonized complications and avant-garde materials culminate in the new Blast collection, a series of self-winding tourbillons (the maison’s first) outfitted in angular sculpted cases designed to resemble the wings of a stealth fighter in profile. Echoing the aviation motif, the tourbillon is of the “flying” variety—supported from beneath by a single bridge rather than anchored between two, making it appear to float above the movement—and rotates within an X-shaped cage. Its three-day power reserve is courtesy of a platinum micro-rotor, placed unconventionally at 12 o’clock, which is visible from the front through the sapphire dial. Price: $44,000 – $54,000; ulysse-nardin.com

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