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Small Perfections – Parmigiani Fleurier Tonda PF Micro Rotor Steel
News
Small Perfections – Parmigiani Fleurier Tonda PF Micro Rotor Steel
It was not lost on me the staggering in-house horological firepower that they brought to the table. In no short order, these included the first industrially produced 30-second tourbillon; an in-house 5Hz chronograph; an in-house 5Hz split seconds chronograph (yes, this is the base of Richard Mille’s movement for the RM 65-01); a dual time zone movement with retrograde date; a perpetual calendar with retrograde date; an insane wandering hour orbital display watch with minute repeater; an amazing GPHG winning Hijri perpetual calendar; and yes, I remembered the Bugatti watch with its vertical movement and display.
From a quality perspective, the watches were irrefutably stellar with everything effectively made in-house by subsidiaries of Parmigiani Fleurier’s parent company, the Sandoz Family Foundation. The cases were from Les Artisans Boîtiers (you would lose your mind if I told you who these guys make cases for), dials by Quadrance & Habillage (ditto on the mind losing thing), movements by Vaucher (yes, three for three in terms of losing your mind), hairsprings by Atokalpa, and even screws by Elwin. The point is that Parmigiani Fleurier watches are unassailable to criticism in terms of their quality. So, all of this should be enough to give some hyper priapic horological chubby. But somehow it didn’t.
But that all changed on the 30th of August in the year of our Lord two zero two one. Because stepping into the Parmigiani Fleurier suite in the Hotel Beau Rivage, I set eyes on a watch that was so mind-blowingly awesome that within two minutes, I had bought one.
You know that scene in the movies, where a guy gets set up on a date and he doesn’t know what to expect. But then she walks into the room, and all of a sudden in his head he hears Whitesnake, and there’s this spotlight on her because she’s just so damn beautiful. Yes, that’s pretty much what happened to me when I set eyes on the new Parmigiani Fleurier Tonda PF. It is, in essence, an integrated bracelet steel sports chic watch with a platinum bezel. But it is also so much more than that.
To me, it is an ingenious expression of ultra-subtle micro details used to create a watch that is apparently minimalistic yet crazily abundant in extraordinary nuance. It is simply unlike anything else out there on the market and its presence on the wrist immediately makes you double take, so tantalizing is its allure.
A New Design Signature
Says Terreni, “When I took over Parmigiani Fleurier, the first thing I wanted to identify was what our design codes were. So, I went to the design team and asked them to tell me what they felt these codes meant to them. Each of them paused for a while, then they started to talk to me about the excellence of the movements or other technical details. And I said, ‘Yes, I agree we have amazing movements but this is not design.’ So, this started me on a search to identify our design DNA, the source code of our aesthetic vision. Interestingly, the first thing I zeroed in on was the PF, which is a seal that is engraved on our bridges and also appears on our rotors as a symbol of quality. I felt somehow that this symbol in its wonderfully discreet way could be the signature for a new family of watches that were at first restrained but at the same time very complex. For me, a watch needs to have this dynamic tension between apparent simplicity and actual complexity, between aggressivity and elegance; this creates the visual tension which becomes energy in design.”
I actually think that Parmigiani Fleurier could lose the “Tonda” reference and just call the resulting collection of watches the “PF,” so vastly different are they to their predecessors. Want an example? Look at where the flared lugs meet the case. At the junction, the lugs are polished in the internal surface where it meets the caseband. Terreni laughs, “From a cost perspective, it makes no sense to do this because it is incredibly expensive. But for me these flared lugs are so stunning and the only way to truly highlight the separation between them and the case is to have this tiny internal surface mirror polished.”
Details Made Perfect
When it comes to a masterpiece of minute detail, the watch’s dial is absolutely that and more. The grain d’orge guilloché pattern is applied to the brass dial using a CNC (computer numerical control) machining process. But the challenge put forth by Terreni was to create this pattern at the smallest scale possible. He laughs when he recalls, “In fact, the person in charge of the dial project was so proud that he managed to get the guilloché pattern so small, but in the end we had to use one size larger. The problem was that once you put the crystal on top of the dial with the smallest pattern, you lose all the detail. But this is also why we use a sapphire crystal with a double anti-reflective coating, so that you can actually see how amazing your dial is.”
And it is perfection, indeed, that he has created because it took me honestly two minutes before I ordered a PF — that’s how much I love it.
Tech Specs
Parmigiani Fleurier Tonda PF Micro Rotor Steel
Ref: PFC914-1020001-100182
Functions: Hours, minutes and date
Case: 40mm; stainless steel with platinum bezel; water resistant to 100m
Dial: Gray with grain d’orge guilloché; rhodium-plated applied indexes
Strap: Stainless steel integrated bracelet
Price: USD 22,900
Details: parmigiani.com