Passionnated by History, it was obvious for Christophe Claret to pay honour to Aventicum, (Avenche), the ancient capital of Roman Helvetia 2'000 years ago, and to the museum. The Aventicum watch unveils a gold replica of the Marcus Aurelius bust (which was found in 1939) in the centre of the dial. Incorporating a technique never before used in the history of watchmaking, the bust – measuring less than three millimetres – is displayed in magnified form thanks to a mirascope, made of two identical parabolic mirrors arranged one on top of the other, creating an elliptical shape. The convex mirror on top has a hole in the middle. When an object is placed in the centre of the concave bottom mirror, the reflection from the top mirror creates a hologram of the object, which appears nearly two times larger than it actually is. Thanks to this optical effect, the bust of Marcus Aurelius looks as if it is thrusting out of the middle of the watch.
Turning over Aventicum, the patented, transparent sapphire-winding rotor is embellished with five numbered Roman Gaul racing chariots in full swing of a thrilling competition. Aventicum is equipped with a automatic caliber which displays hours and minutes. It is available in two versions: rose gold or white gold with grade 5 grey anthracite PVD titanium, repectively limited to 68 and 38 models.
The delivery of the timepieces matches the celebration of the 2'000 years anniversary of Avenches which will take place May 22nd–25th, 2015. With this watch, Christophe Claret hopes to raise awareness about the phenomenal efforts of the museum to preserve these vestiges of this ancient civilization and to generate support from the Swiss government to construct a new building to conserve this heritage.
