Home » The Salon International De La Haute Horlogerie » SIHH 2017 Review – Girard-Perregaux Tri-Axial Planetarium Watch
Last month at the SIHH 2017, Girard-Perregaux unveiled some amazing timepieces with baked-in technological innovations. One of them is a stunning Tri-Axial Planetarium Watch which combines technical expertise, recognizable style and traditional craftsmanship that make the essence of the manufacturer’s DNA.
Girard-Perregaux Tri-Axial Planetarium is one of the few triple-axis Tourbillons in the watchmaking industry. It boasts two manually painted, miniature complications: a rotating globe with a day/night indication and a moon-phase display. This exceptional novelty defies gravity with the high speed 3D rotation of its Tourbillon, as well as with its terrestrial globe which makes a rotation in 24 hours, thus providing an intuitive view of the time across the globe.
The cartography of the glob shows the world as it was in 1791 which is the year when the house of Girard-Perregaux was established. Also, the moon-phase disc depicts the 17th-century selenography at the time the telescope was invented, impressively matching the blue nuances of the rotating globe and reproducing the Earth’s satellite as we see it.
Girard-Perregaux Tri-Axial Planetarium Watch – Micro Painting
The new Tri-Axial Planetarium is housed in a colossal 18-karat pink gold case measuring 48mm in diameter and 18.66mm in thickness. The case boasts an impressive design with an imposing curved case middle, a beveled bezel and cambered lugs. The elegant case incorporates two sapphires domes and a side opening which offers a look at the tourbillon from all angles.
From the rear, there is a transparent case back which ensures a perfect view of the complex mechanism inside the case. The beating heart of the Tri-Axial Planetarium is the in-house manufactured caliber GP09310-0001 hand-winding movement which is capable to store enough energy to keep the watch working for approximately 70 hours. The impeccable movement consists of 386 individual components and fuels hours, minutes, moon phase and day/night functions. The 42 jewels movement operates at the semi-rapid frequency of 21,600 alternations per hour (3Hz).
Underneath the front sapphire glass lies a silver-toned guilloché dial with a pattern evoking Earth’s meridians and punctuated by Arabic numerals and hour-markers swept over by dauphine-styled hands. The rear baseplate is sandblasted and treated with black PVD to highlight the ‘night’ side of the day/night indicator.
Girard-Perregaux Tri-Axial Planetarium (ref. 99290-52-151-BA6A) is mounted on a black alligator leather strap fitted with a pink gold folding clasp. The new watch from the house of Girard-Perregaux is constructed to resist water pressure up to 30 meters (about 100 feet).
