Total retrograde – Style

Yury Khnychkin, executive editor of Kommersant Style, talks about the premieres of the oldest and one of the most prestigious Geneva watch manufactories at Watches & Wonders 2023.

Recall, if anyone has forgotten: in Russian it is customary to call a retrograde person a backward person who opposes progress. reactionary in general. For watchmakers, a retrograde is just a pointer, jumping back to the starting mark after passing through the scale. One of the watch complications, a cute knuckle, testifying to the energy reserve accumulated in the mechanism for the decisive throw. The most obvious way to study retrograde indicators is on the example of minute ones: one day, perhaps without even setting a goal, you accidentally catch an instant at the border of the 59th and 60th minutes and see how everything happens: p-time – and the arrow instantly flew off to the beginning scales. The retrograde hour hand is rare (usually the so-called jumping hour on the disk indicator is used instead), so all other people who want to watch the mechanical attraction have to be patient and wait for either midnight on Monday (retrograde day of the week indicator) or the end of the last day of the month (retrograde indicator dates). Which is what is recommended for new products in 2023 from the oldest Genevan manufactory.

To be honest, I wouldn’t classify retrogrades as one of Vacheron Constantin’s favorite complications. God knows why this year she decided to focus on them. The task of historical legitimization of retrogrades was entrusted to my good friend, the director of the manufactory for style and heritage, Christian Selmoni. And it was carried out with honor: Christian carefully provided each novelty with multiple references to vintage samples. Fortunately, in the archives of Vacheron Constantin, conducted since 1755, as in that Greece, there is everything.

One retrograde, two retrogrades…

The most “affordable” way to observe retrograde is Overseas Moon Phase Retrograde Date. The representative of a fashionable family (not for nothing that the manufactory describes it as “the first Vacheron Constantin sports watch with a retrograde indicator”) in a steel case with a diameter of 41 mm and a thickness of 10.48 mm with a blue lacquered sun-effect dial offers a retrograde date display (from 1 to th to the 31st) located at the top of the dial, and the moon phase indicator at the bottom. The movement is automatic in-house, with a massive gold winding rotor visible through the sapphire case back. The set comes with three straps: a steel bracelet, blue calfskin and blue rubber (a common practice for the Overseas collection).

If one retrograde indicator is not enough, then there is a Bi-Retro variant, as watchmakers say. This is the Patrimony Retrograde Day-Date, a costumed representative of the much more prestigious Patrimony collection, which is hinted at by a 42.5 mm diameter and 9.7 mm thick case made of super expensive platinum. On the salmon-colored dial, always relevant for expensive watches, you will already find two retrograde indicators: the date (at the top) and the day of the week (at the bottom). The model is equipped with an automatic manufactory movement with an openwork gold winding rotor in the form of the emblem of the manufactory – the Maltese cross.

… and not only a retrograde

Climbing up the hierarchy of “Washron” novelties, we will inevitably meet with the Traditionnelle Tourbillon Retrograde Date Openface, that is, a skeletonized (with a transparent dial) model with a retrograde date indicator and a tourbillon. I would call it a semi-skeleton, as there are separate elements of the dial in a beautiful slate gray color. From the name of the watch its functionality is clear, I will add a couple of remarks: the retrograde date indicator is in the upper semicircle of the dial, the winding drum, the knot of the engagement (winding crown) and the tourbillon carriage at the 6 o’clock mark, made in the form of a Maltese cross, are left visible. A special visual feast awaits at the back: an automatic manufactory movement with a 72-hour power reserve, with a circumferential sector-rotating rotor that does not obscure the view of the mechanism with filigree polished “waves”, sapphire bearings and numerous gold inscriptions that warm the wearer’s soul. The case with a diameter of 41 mm and a thickness of 11.07 mm is made of rose gold. A definite like, despite my skepticism about the “skeleton-like”.

Finally, once again, Atelier Cabinotiers, a subdivision specializing in individual orders, demonstrated its non-trivial capabilities, named after the “cabinotiers” – watchmakers of the 18th-first half of the 19th centuries, who embodied any wishes of customers. Shown are the one-of-a-kind Les Cabinotiers Dual Moon Grand Complication with 11 complications, including a minute repeater, a tourbillon (hidden location, visible only from the inside), a perpetual calendar (in this case, a retrograde is represented by a date indicator in the upper sector of the dial), a double moon phase indicator for the northern and southern hemispheres, a map of the starry sky and an indicator of hours calculated from the stars (sidereal days are 23 hours 56 minutes 4 seconds). Reversible (with two functional dials on either side of the case), the watch is housed in a massive 46 mm diameter and 17.1 mm thick white gold case and is powered by a hand-wound in-house movement derived from the famous caliber 2755, developed for the 250th anniversary of Vacheron Constantin, which was celebrated in 2005. In this case, the price is expressed, I’m sure, in seven-digit numbers in foreign currency, which can be explained both by the complexity of the movement, and by the thoroughness of execution and the exclusivity of the watch.

Yuri Khnychkin