BY HARLAN CHAPMAN-GREEN
Nacre, also known as mother-of-pearl, is renowned for its shimmering appearance, which lends itself perfectly to the dials of luxury wristwatches. For 2026, Czapek brings this luxurious material to life with two new wristwatches, the Antarctique S Ice Cloud and the Promenade Midnight Pearl.
To make its visions a reality, Czapek favours what it describes as a “horizontal manufacture”, meaning that it works proudly with a network of partners and gladly tells us who it collaborated with – something that’s a bit too rare in the luxury watch industry. For the mother-of-pearl dials on these new watches, Czapek has teamed up with GT Cadrans, a prestigious dialmaker within the Gemmes Tech Group.
Antarctique S Ice Cloud
The first piece, the Antarctique S Ice Cloud, has a stainless steel case measuring 38.5mm x 10.6mm with 120m of water resistance and that beautiful tapering stainless steel bracelet with alternating brushed and polished links. The dial of the Ice Cloud watch really does represent what its name suggests, the light blue hand-varnished dial captures perfectly the fluffy nature of the clouds in the sky. To achieve this finish, called nacre brouillée, or blurred nacre, a 0.2mm thick white mother-of-pearl base receives a blue varnish on its underside, using a horsehair brush to create a unique puffy pattern.
This is completely different to slapping some paint haphazardly on some skirting board, like something I might do on a Saturday afternoon. Each brush stroke has to apply the perfect amount of varnish to create a convincing effect without applying so much paint that the watch won’t physically fit together due to the paint’s thickness. Once perfected, the varnish is heated in an oven at over 100 °C (212 °F) for several hours. Only one person at GT Cadrans can produce the nacre brouilée dials for Czapek, which ensures consistency but also limits production. As such, Czapek is making just ten Antarctique S Ice Cloud watches.
Each watch features the self-winding calibre SXH5, conceived and designed in-house by Czapek. It features an offset micro-rotor made from recycled platinum, which adds to the modern design approach Czapek has chosen for this calibre’s appearance. With open bridges, anglage, and finished wheels, the SXH5 has a lot to love about its appearance. But, with a variable inertia balance, a 4Hz beat rate and 60-hour power reserve, it’s got all the modern specs.
The price before taxes is USD $33,600.
Promenade Midnight Pearl
The second watch is a beautiful addition to Czapek’s Promenade collection, introduced in 2024. The newest piece, called the Promenade Midnight Pearl, takes dial complexity to the next level beyond the Antarctique. A 0.2mm thick disk of Tahitian mother-of-pearl, known for its grey hue with green and violet colourations, is overlaid with blue aventurine glass. The aventurine is thinned out to just 0.2mm thick, like the base, meaning the dial’s total thickness is 0.4mm, thinner than your average credit card. As you can imagine, thinning down the aventurine glass while preserving its good looks and those of the mother-of-pearl below it, while also not accidentally crushing the thing in half, is difficult work. Then, to add to the delicacy requirement, they also need to mill the groove for the subseconds dial at 4:30. Czapek says this is the most difficult part of the patented dial-making process.
The result of all of GT Cadrans’ and Czapek’s work is, well, it’s pretty marvellous, isn’t it? I cannot wait to see one of these in person at Watches & Wonders Geneva. The Tahitian mother-of-pearl dial creates the shimmering base for that blue aventurine to bring to life a star-filled night sky reflected in still water.
All of this is presented in a stainless steel case measuring 38mm x 10.8mm with 50m of water resistance. It’s presented on a dark blue nubuck leather strap, although a Milanese bracelet is also available. Within the watch sits the calibre SXH5.1. This variation of the movement features the offset subseconds display of this watch, rather than the central red-tipped seconds hand seen on the Antarctique. It still features a 4Hz beat rate and a 60-hour power reserve from one barrel, topped up by a recycled platinum micro rotor, and is just 4.2mm thick.
Limited to 38 pieces, the new Promenade Midnight Pearl retails for USD $26,300 before taxes.
These new watches continue to showcase Czapek’s playfulness and creativity with their designs, utilising new manufacturing techniques from their partners to create watches that live up to their tagline: “We collect rare people”.
