Now you thought you’d seen some nice watches (The Opus 7, or the Chanel Mysterieuse), but this, my friends, is the Greubel Forsey GMT. Greubel Forsey is an ultra high-end watchmaker, with watchmaking patents that include a tourbillion (a novelty that offsets the effects of gravity on the watch’s movement) that sits at 30° from parallel that has a 24-second rotation, instead of a full 60.
This watch has a bunch of eye catching features, the most obvious being the brilliant blue globe at the 8 o’ clock position on the dial. This titanium sphere takes world timekeeping to a whole new level: the globe makes one complete rotation every 24 hours (in the direction of Earth’s natural rotation), and the position of the continents can be neatly cross-referenced with the 24-hour day/night ring. (The night hemisphere is indicated by a blackened half of the ring , and the daytime hemisphere is indicated by the whitened portion.) This “whitened” portion is enhanced by a hidden lateral window integrated into the caseband, which lets in light to symbolize “daytime” on the globe. This way the viewer can know with just one quick glance the time anywhere in the world – a detail that sets Gruebel Forsey apart from other watchmakers as true purveyors of elite design.
Other features of the dial include a standard hour-minute clock dial at the 1 o’clock position, complemented by a separate seconds dial at 2 o’clock. 3 o’clock indicates the watch’s power reserve. Moving further along the dial, you will see what is arguably the watch’s second most striking feature – Greubel Forsey’s fantastic 24 Second tourbillon. This ”leaning” tourbillon, patented and perfected by Gruebel Forsey themselves, inclines at an angle of 25° and rotates nearly three times faster than a normal tourbillon. (Once every 24 seconds.) This is mostly an aesthetic feature of fine watchmaking these days, but it’s hard for someone not to notice this fancy whirligig spinning on your wrist.
Turning over the GMT reveals a beautifully crafted ‘worldtime’ disc, which bears the names of 24 cities; each representing a different global time zone. Aligning the relevant city with the local hour on the outer chapter ring sets the dial-side globe in the correct position.
This watch will set you back a cool $690,000, so start planning your investment portfolio now.
Technical features of this watch include:
-436 moving components
-18k white gold dial and casing
-Anti-reflective treated sapphire covering dial and other apertures
-Three-dimensional titanium rotating globe
-2nd dial for 12-hour world-time view
-25° 24 Secondes Tourbillon to ensure accuracy (87 individual components)
-72-hour power reserveindicated on dial
-World-time disc on back with 24 global cities
-Hand-sewn black alligator leather strap
Check out this video of the ‘GMT’ in action at the 2012 Salon de la Haute Horologie watch convention in Geneva:
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