BY HARLAN CHAPMAN-GREEN
Can you believe it’s been 20 years since Greubel Forsey was founded? I can’t, but I’ve only been here for half of it. Anyway, the company’s been working on a brand new chronograph watch, their very first chronograph watch. We’ve been waiting some time for something like this, in fact, we might’ve waited too long considering that this has been out for a few days and yet the forums haven’t been set alight. Indeed, one of the most prestigious watchmakers of the modern era drops a bomb like this and we’ve heard nearly nothing since.
Despite what I wrote above, you should pay attention to this one. Greubel Forsey is not a maker of your average luxury mechanical watches; they’re more mechanical works of art. They’re finished impeccably and use intriguing designs to dazzle spectators, but they’re more function-ing than function-al. Still, we can all appreciate works of art when we see them. With that said, this is one of the least attention-grabbing pieces they’ve made as it measures 37.90mm x 10.49mm, is made of white gold and has a tantalum bezel and caseback ring. Water resistance is 30m, if you care.
Just because this is their first crack at the chronograph, that doesn’t mean they’ve bought in any old movement or even resurrected a vintage calibre. On a side note, if Greubel Forsey ever did either of those, it would be time for them to shut up shop. The watch features a hand-wound calibre designed and manufactured to redefine the chronograph, according to them. Their website uses the prefix ‘nano’ a lot, but it doesn’t explain much of what’s happening here.
First, we should address the ‘EWT’ acronym in the watch’s name. It means Experimental Watch Technology, and it’s Greubel Forsey’s way of saying they’re being bolder than usual, which is saying something. The watch features the brand’s first-ever flying tourbillon atop which sits a constantly moving “nano” foudroyante.
The foudroyante breaks down the seconds into six fractions of a second, and we last saw it on Jaeger-LeCoultre’s Duomètre watches from back at Watches & Wonders Geneva. In true Greubel Forsey fashion, it’s been plonked straight on the top of the flying tourbillon and, through engineering magic, remains upright as it goes around. The “nano” in “nano” foudroyante refers to the very low power use this particular design has compared to the normal, which saps extra power from the balance wheel, thus affecting accuracy. Greubel Forsey’s design reduces the foudroyante‘s power consumption by 1,800 times. They haven’t said how they achieved their power reduction feat, but their approach to rethinking and refining existing things reminds me of Rolex’s approach when reworking something as simple as the lever escapement into their ‘Chronergy’ escapement. The new design of the mechanism also reduces the space required by 90%, meaning it can be added straight onto the tourbillon as it has here. Strange but inventive.
Strange but inventive should probably be their motto, even though the movement looks very different from the miniature ‘cities’ we’ve come to expect from the elite chronograph makers. The beautifully decorated movement uses a visible column wheel, but who knows where the vertical clutch is. It’s in there, though, and it’s a new type of mechanism which Greubel Forsey says removes any play in the gears. The chronograph is also stopped and started via the pusher at 2 O’clock but is reset by the pusher set within the crown, which is strange but inventive, I guess. The manually wound movement also has a 24-hour power reserve when the chronograph runs. When it’s not running? I have no idea; Greubel Forsey isn’t saying, which is strange, although not really inventive.
Now, I’ll be one of the first to say that I’m not the biggest fan of most of Greubel Forsey’s watches; I find them weird. But I can respect and marvel at engineering, and they fully deserve all the praises you can sing about them. This new one is the most normal-looking watch from them yet, but you have to give them credit for what they’ve done here. Of course, this is an independent watchmaker known for making some of the most radical watches ever, and not making many of them. The eleven watches that will be made will set their new owners back CHF465,000 making it one of their most expensive watches. They’ve probably all sold off into private collections now, never to be seen again, which is good financially but makes it hard for us mere mortals to appreciate them.
