Now Live: Montblanc Villeret Tourbillon Bi-Cylindrique, Ref. 106494

Now live: the Montblanc Collection Villeret Tourbillon Bi-Cylindrique in 18k white gold, one of eight. Introduced in 2011 from the former Minerva workshops in Villeret, it pairs a one-minute tourbillon with a double cylindrical balance spring, an idea borrowed from 18th-century marine chronometers, and shows the time on floating sapphire discs. Complete with box, papers and loupe.

Why It Matters

Minerva spent a century and a half in Villeret building some of Switzerland’s most respected chronograph movements before Richemont brought the workshop into Montblanc in 2006. The Villeret collection is the output of that manufacture, and it is where Montblanc’s haute horlogerie credibility truly comes from.

The Bi-Cylindrique was its statement piece. Marine chronometers used cylindrical hairsprings because they breathe more evenly than a flat spiral, keeping rate stable as the mainspring runs down. Montblanc set two of them concentrically inside the tourbillon carriage, oscillating in opposite phase, and claimed a first for a wristwatch tourbillon. The carriage alone has 95 hand-finished components.

Then it hid the hands. Hours and minutes ride on rotating sapphire discs in a Heures Mystérieuses display at six o’clock, leaving the open mainplate and the tourbillon at twelve to carry the dial.

This Example

The case is a 47mm teardrop in 18k white gold, cambered and tapering toward six, with a bezel that turns from concave to convex around its circumference. It arrives complete: the piano black presentation box, loupe, full papers, booklets, accessories and outer box.

Specifications

Reference

106494

Case

47mm x 15mm 18k white gold, teardrop form

Movement

Manufacture Calibre MB M65.63

Complications

One-minute tourbillon, double cylindrical balance spring, mystery hours and minutes

Strap

Black alligator, white gold pin buckle

Production

Eight pieces in white gold

Set

Box, papers, loupe, booklets, outer box

Price

$275,000

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