The new Arnold & Son piece from the Royal collection is a testament to the beauty of micro-mechanics. The piece called Nebula displays a perfectly harmonious open-worked movement which was made to be almost completely symmetrical. The watch does not offer many complications, in fact, it only tells hours, minutes and seconds, but it still draws the attention with its superbly structured and finished in-house hand-wound movement with a hefty power reserve. Arnold & Son Royal Nebula is made in subdued dimensions, when it comes to both its diameter and the thickness. The piece is available in two case materials, red gold and steel. The former has the price tag of around $25,750, while the latter one costs about $14,500.
Anrold & Son Nebula was clearly envisioned as an open-worked piece, as opposed to more common practice of skeletonizing already existing movements. Because of this approach, the brand’s designers paid a lot of attention to the architecture of the movement. The final result of the approach is pretty impressive since they have managed to create a lovely symmetrical ensemble.
The skeleton movement features two exposed mainspring barrels on the top which are mirrored on the other half with a balance wheel and a small seconds counter. These circular segments and other components of the caliber are held in place by ten triangular and open-worked bridges. It is a precedent to have so many bridges, since common movements have no more than four. Not only that they have the same design, the bridges all radiate from the periphery towards the center and underline the symmetrical architectonics of the entire structure. Additionally, this star like appearance of (seven most visible) bridges is also the reason for the name of the piece itself, since the start-like structured movement looked to the designers as an inverted star and nebula that is the astronomical term for the region in which new stars are born from and the old ones disappear into.
As expected, the exposed movement is finished with haute horlogerie decorations performed by hand. Its wheels and bridges are chamfered, while the latter ones are also subsequently polished. Furthermore, flat surfaces are brushed, jewels are set in gold chatons and screw heads are beveled and mirror-polished. Additionally, bridges are NAC-treated and main-plate is ADLC-coated for the more affordable version. For the more lavish version, the former component is palladium-coated, while the latter is NAC-coated.
As for the supported features, the only ones are hours and minutes shown by central hands and seconds that are displayed in a small counter next to the exposed regulating organ which beats at the frequency of 21,600 vph. Caliber A&S5101 used in the piece is mechanical and hand-wound and it integrates 24 jewels in its construction. The skeleton movement is adjusted to five positions. It is 31.5 mm wide and just 4.04 mm thick. Thanks to the exposed twin main-spring barrels, it has the opulent power reserve of 90 hours, which means it needs to be wound every four days.
The case of Arnold & Son Nebula model is round and 41.5 mm wide. The watch has a very thin profile of just 8.73 mm, which is possible because its movement is more than twice thinner. There are two options for the material of the case: 5 n red gold and stainless steel. The construction also includes a fixed bezel, a see-through back, and a cambered sapphire crystal that is treated with anti-reflective coating on both sides. The watch is waterproof to 30 meters. As for the skeleton dial, it is reduced only to a chapter ring which is anthracite in the steel model and light gray in the gold one.
Two versions of Arnold & Son Nebula likewise have different leather straps. The more affordable one is paired with a hand-aged anthracite calf leather attachment, while the other one features a black alligator leather wristlet.
