Gustave Eiffel, this French visionary engineer who has marked an entire era thanks to his great architectural achievements, has created more than 300 structures all over the world, among which the Eiffel Tower of course, the metallic frame of the New York Statue of Liberty, as well as various bridges, including the Maria Pia of Porto bridge, and has also actively participated to the completion of the Panama canal project.
All these works are marked by his quest for the purity of the lines, for the combination of iron with glass, and for the strength and lightness of shapes. An everyday elegance that remains contemporary even today and that will be inspiring designers and creators for centuries to come.
Exalting the vision of his ancestor, namely to «Combine Beauty with Practicality», Philippe Couperie Eiffel is refining high-end watchmaking with his collaboration with Cvstos. After the Gustave Eiffel model, launched last year, the brand presents today the «Gustave Eiffel Tourbillon».
The main theme of the look of this timepiece is inspired from and founded on the metallic structure of the famous Cross of Saint Andrew, a technical heritage, which, according to Gustave Eiffel, easily represents mathematical beauty.
The «CVS2600 Tourbillon-S», with a power reserve of 60 hours, is a hand-winding movement designed in the same vein of motives inspired from Gustave Eiffel’s principles. The perforated barrel drum which allows to take a peek at the charging status of the movement reminds of the drive wheels of the Tower’s lifts. At 6 o’clock we can admire through a large sapphire crystal the flying tourbillon cage making 1 round per minute to indicate the small second, and all is magnified by the transparency of the bimetallic skeleton dial. The indicator is carved from the block through various state-of-the-art technological processes. The dial’s high readability is facilitated by the metallic indexes whose centre is covered in a luminescent material.
The transparent case-back immerses us into the heart of the mechanism to discover a structure divided by 3 bridges, each with a specific function, which isolate it from the mechanical stresses of the gear-train from the barrel (energy provider) and the tourbillon cage (regulator).
The cage of the flying Tourbillon mounted on a high-precision bearing (clearing away any sort of shock) is structurally and completely isolated from the rest of the mechanism, with only one connection, namely one single wheel to the wheel train, independently attached to the super rigid platinum whose barrel bridge is once again attached to the latter in an autonomous way. Such archetype was designed and created to increase the performance and thus the efficiency of the chronometric performance.
The tonneau-shaped case, water-resistant to 100 m, is carved out of 316-L steel, PVD bronze or 5N pink gold treated steel.
The Gustave Eiffel Tourbillon is completed with an alligator strap lined with Alcantara® leather. Only 10 pieces of this timepiece will be produced.
