The record -breaking run by Vacheron Constantin continues. After the record for the world’s most complicated pocket look last year with the Les Cabinotiers Berkley Grand Complication and its 63 functions, the luxury Swiss watchmaker has now set a benchmark for the world’s most complicated wrist watch: The Les Cabinia.
The unique watch, the brand said it took eight years to develop and had 13 patents, was not commissioned by a private customer. Instead, this year it was made for the 270 -year anniversary of Vacheron.
“We always have one or two projects such as Solaria in our mind and some are stopped because of various factors, but the idea is always to demonstrate our excellence in high craftsmanship and watch,” said Sandrine Donguy, product and innovation director of Vacheron Constantin.
What are the complications of the Solaria? In addition to regular indications such as the time and date, and recognized high-quality watch functions such as an eternal calendar, a chronograph in a fraction of a second (those two events can time at the same time) and five Chiming functions, it has 14 astronomical functions, five of which Vacheron said they will be shifting in a watch for the first time.
Four of those follow the sun, hence the name of the watch, while the fifth shows the hours until a certain star appears in the air. “It’s like a small telescope on the wrist,” said Mrs. Donguy.
The watch, she added, was made possible by the technological progress of artificial intelligence-driven production that can produce small components for microscopic tolerances.
“The resourcefulness of this project was in combining high complications with miniaturization, so we could have these small components,” she said, noticed that the company had worked on tolerances of a tenth of a millimeter.
As a result, Vacheron has pressed the 1,521 components of the watch in a white gold cabinet of 45 millimeters that is slightly less than 15 millimeters thick. Indications are displayed on both sides of the watch, allowing Vacheron to retain its typical clean dial -testics.
Production and ergonomic challenges have led to that watches with a large number of complications are not very far in between. Patek Philippe’s best effort is his grandmaster -chim with 20 complications. The most complicated watch for the solaria is supposed to be Franck Muller’s $ 2.7 million aeternitas Mega 4, with 36 complications.
How much further Vacheron can go? “Sometimes the industry is not mature enough to enable us to continue,” said Mrs. Donguy. “But I will come back to the search of humanity to always look further. What about a display that looks up from the moon, which looks at the sun from a different corner? The possibilities are endless.”
