With its parent company Richemont’s acquisition of Geneva manufacture Roger Dubuis in 2008, Cartier leveraged the facility’s location by adding workshops that enabled the Paris brand to attain the coveted Geneva Seal, a historic and exacting quality assurance stamp for timepieces produced in the canton of Geneva. This year, Cartier wowed us with a number of impressive technical movements stamped with Geneva Seal: the Astrotourbillon, the perpetual calendar, and the flying tourbillon. The Rotonde de Cartier skeleton flying tourbillon, though, is an especially striking model.
Limited to 100 pieces, the striking 18-karat white gold Rotonde de Cartier skeleton flying tourbillon (price upon request) flaunts Cartier’s enhanced technical prowess through clear, sapphire crystals. The watch’s manual-wind caliber 9455 MC movement performs double duty as the dial with its main plate and bridges cut away to form graphic Roman-numeral hour markers, which create an airy lattice around the periphery while framing the carriage of the flying tourbillon at six o’clock. With its skeletonized barrel and visible spring, the movement’s impeccable hand finishing—from angled bridges to satin-brushed sides to circular-grained wheels—is on full display. Produced in the aforementioned Geneva workshops, the Cartier caliber 9455 MC watch is stamped with the Geneva Seal and delivered with a numbered certificate of origin. (www.cartier.com)
