2013/05/22

HARRY WINSTON the Ocean Tourbillon Jumping Hour

The Harry Winston Ocean Collection introduces, for the first time, a combination of two sophisticated complications in a single timepiece: the Harry Winston Ocean Tourbillon Jumping Hour. The jumping hour complication, new for the Ocean Collection, adds its dynamic presence to a remarkable timepiece that is a showcase for Harry Winston's calibre HW4401, which required more than 1500 hours of development.

The tourbillon is considered one of watchmaking's most sophisticated complications –originally developed at the dawn of the 19th century. Today, the tourbillon is revered by connoisseurs not only for the history and craftsmanship it represents, but also for the mesmerizing visual effect it creates, which is unlike any other complication.

The tourbillon in the Ocean Tourbillon Jumping Hour has a very unusual design. Instead of being located on the back of the movement plate, it is suspended from two gleaming, hand-chamfered steel bridges which seem to hold it free in space –seeming to move with no apparent mechanical connection to the rest of the timepiece. Only sharp eyes will uncover its secret: the tourbillon is driven by a wheel geared to its outer circumference, which is nearly completely concealed by the minute track of the dial.

Floating in between two panes of sapphire, the tourbillon's open structure contrasts with the rich opacity of the dial, which is also suspended from a system of meticulously hand-finished, open-worked bridges. Executed in black sapphire, the dial reveals the hour through an aperture at the 12 o’clock position, which "jumps" instantaneously once per hour. Unlike many jumping hour watches, the Ocean Tourbillon Jumping Hour timepiece has a minute hand which has been specifically designed so that the hour window is never blocked.

The Ocean Tourbillon Jumping Hour timepiece provides a powerful visual experience –its design draws inspiration from the vocabulary of classic Modernist architecture, which takes advantage of the unique structural and visual properties of steel and glass to create a bold geometry that is also the essence of the Ocean Tourbillon Jumping Hour watch. The combination of a tourbillon rotating once every sixty seconds and a minute hand rotating once per hour is a mechanical meditation on the nature of time itself –with the action of the jumping hour complication lending its own special tempo to this symphony of high horology.

 

 

 

 

 

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