2019 SIHH Review: Hits and Misses

Another SIHH has come and gone. I think 2019 will be remembered as the year Richard Mille brought a candy shop to Geneva. Until next year when they open a Home Depot/DIY like store for their booth and all their watches feature 100%authentic wood nails and hammer-drills and sawzalls™.(Milwaukee Electric Tool Company)

I’ve only presented a handful of the best here. There’s tons of coverage elseware so I really wanted to distill it down to my absolute favorites.

JLC’s Enamel tourbillion repeater ?

Jaeger LeCoultre had a hit last year at SIHH with three similar lower end models in the Master Control Collection. This year they brought the most heat possible with the MASTER GRANDE TRADITION GYROTOURBILLON WESTMINSTER PERPÉTUEL. That’s a mouthful. Limited to 18 pieces spread across two different color enamel dials, this repeater uses four gongs and hammers to repeat the “Westminster Chime”. Buy now for $800,000.

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Sound on. Six years of development, twelve patents, more than 1,050 parts to create this masterpiece combining a Gyrotourbillon, a minute repeater with a Westminster chime and a perpetual calendar. __ Master Grande Tradition Gyrotourbillon Westminster Perpétuel. Limited edition of 18 pieces. __ #JaegerLeCoultre #HybrisMechanica #SIHH2019 #ArtOfPrecision #FineWatchmaking #MetiersRares #SwissWatch #ValleeDeJoux #Craftsmanship #SavoirFaire #精妙之芯时间之艺

A post shared by Jaeger-LeCoultre (@jaegerlecoultre) on Jan 28, 2019 at 8:08am PST

TOURBILLON SOUVERAIN VERTICAL

I like FP Journe. I don’t like tourbillons, much. This reference features the regulator rotated “vertical” as the name of the watch implies. It also rotates every 30 seconds instead of the typical 60. I wasn’t able to get a video of the piece in action but stay tuned, video will pop up at some point. Look how amazing just the back of the movement is! The bridge is a bit clunky, but I’ll allow it. Priced around $250,000.

The Vacheron Constantin Traditionnelle Twin Beat Perpetual Calendar

Finally a perpetual calendar for the lazy-man or woman.

This piece features a high-frequency and a low frequency mode. In low frequency it has a 65 day power reserve. Because of this I think it might be the only perpetual calendar I could actually keep on time. I have almost every other perpetual calendar and they’re always wrong because I forget to wind them and am too cheap to buy winders. The dial is a beautiful guilloche with a partial skeleton interference. The gold wheels, the visible leap year wheel at 6 o’clock. Outstanding. Throw out your old perpetuals and pick this up for $199K.