Old habits die hard. We hear “rattrapante”, we think “chronograph”. Which 99% of the time will be the case. The remaining 1% is where Parmigiani Fleurier has chosen to venture with a refreshingly inventive view that focuses not on the seconds hand, the natural attribute of a rattrapante or split-seconds chronograph, but on the hour and minute hands.
As often, the idea was staring us in the face but, because it is so simple, no-one had actually seen it . The bare-bones definition of a rattrapante hand is one that instantly catches up with a moving hand. There are no stipulations as to whether this movement should be clockwise or anticlockwise, whether it should be a single or double hand, and nothing about whether it should be the hand for the hours, minutes or seconds. It’s an open playing field, as Parmigiani Fleurier demonstrates not once, but twice.
The reverse countdown: ingeniously simple
The first iteration is the Tonda PF Minute Rattrapante and, as mentioned, the idea is ingeniously simple. Alongside the usual duo of hour and minute hands, the Manufacture has added a second minute hand which sits under the first until actuated by two pushers. Visually, it looks remarkably like a chronograph but don’t be fooled. It isn’t.
The pusher at 8 o’clock advances the hidden minute hand in five-minute increments. The pusher at 10 o’clock, minute by minute, the purpose being to count down a lapse of time. For example, if it’s 10:10 and we want to measure an eight-minute period, we advance the second, hidden hand to 10:18. The eight minutes will have passed when the first minute hand has caught up with the second. When this function is no longer required, a press on the pusher in the crown, at 3 o’clock, resets the rattrapante hand which returns to its hidden position.
The mechanism requires less energy than an actual countdown function: the kind found on certain chronometers and regatta watches. As always in watchmaking, the objective is to create a movement that is less complex, less power-hungry and therefore more reliable. It is the very essence of a well-designed concept that returns to the principle of a countdown mechanism with a more elegant, simplified construction.
GMT Rattrapante: simplicity itself
Parmigiani Fleurier then applied the idea to the GMT function. The second time zone is another area in which complications abound: home time, reference cities, am/pm indication, even a synchronised date. Parmigiani Fleurier cuts to the chase. The Tonda PF GMT Rattrapante again comes down to two visible hands, for hours and minutes. And again one of these hands, the hour hand, hides a third, for the second time zone.
Thanks to a pusher at 7 o’clock, this second hour hand emerges from the shadow of the first and advances in one-hour jumps. Henceforth, the Tonda displays the time in two different zones: one with a rose gold hand and the other with a rhodium-plated hand. The user chooses which hand corresponds to home time and which hand shows local time. Back on home soil, when the second time zone display is no longer needed, one press on the pusher coaxial with the crown and the GMT hand returns to its position under the main hour hand. Simplicity, elegance and creativity: Parmigiani Fleurier’s entire philosophy encapsulated in two watches.
