Hublot recently opened its first stand alone boutique in China and at the same time announced its newest ambassador, Mr. Jet Li.  Li is a film star and martial artist — you may recall him from Lethal Weapon 4 (way back in 1998!) or  perhaps beside his more famous counterpart, Mr Jackie Chan in The Forbidden Kingdom (2008). Anyway, seems like a cool partnership, and best part is that Li even decided to show up to the grand opening ceremony wearing tennis shoes….I had to laugh.

Never shy…

Recommending a nice interview with Hublot “Midas Touch man” Jean-Claude Biver that was recently published by Professional Watches.  It’s worth a read.   In particular I enjoyed the discussion of Hublot’s new in-house movement series known as “UNICO”.  Click through and check it out!

Hublot UNICO short video

Older, but also good interviews with Jean-Claude Biver can be seen HERE (my own May 2009 Interview with him), HERE (Formula 1 Interviews him in May 2010), and HERE (Chronos 24 interviews him at Baselworld 2010).

Cool…but pricey!

For about $24,000, you can protect your $5,000 Rolex in style.  Or have the humidor edition and protect your [insert expensive cigar name here].  My only question is this — what is to prevent a would be thief from simply taking the safe and cutting it apart later?  Seems like this is more of an expensive novelty than anything.  A Christmas gift for the wealthy tycoon who has everything!

More details and pics over on the Perpetuelle.com Watch News Feed.

Döttling COLOSIMO Safe

Formula 1 Legend Michael Schumacher is the new Audemars Piguet icon.  The official announcement went out today at a press conference in Germany.  Read the official scoop HERE on the Perpetuelle.com Watch News Feed.

Limited Edition(s) will surely follow.  Stay tuned.

Masculine 47mm titanium case…

Hope you all had a nice and relaxing Turkey Day….now back to watches!  After a strong showing by Cartier at SIHH 2010 (see them all here), I am excited to see what will come out of the ambitious new “manufacture” in 2011.  At least one of the watches to be presented at the SIHH 2011 in Geneva will be the new “Calibre de Cartier Astrotourbillon” you see below.   The “Calibre de Cartier” collection made its debut last year with a couple of very nice base models – you can view my Jan 2010 introduction and follow up thoughts on the Calibre de Cartier for more details.  You may also recall that the manual wind ‘Calibre 9451 MC Astrotourbillon’ movement likewise made its debut last year, except in a different model – the slightly more refined and elegant “Rotonde de Cartier”.

So what all this basically means is that Cartier is putting the Astrotourbillon (aka “Calibre 9451 MC”) movement into the Calibre de Cartier case.  With an impressive and very masculine looking watch being the end result.  Scroll down for more details and comparisons.

Cartier Calibre de Cartier Astrotourbillon

47mm titanium case on black alligator strap, limited edition 100 pieces (numbered)

close ups:

angle view

compared to the Calibre de Cartier base model:

compared to the Rotonde de Cartier Astrotourbillon:

If you are a big Cartier fan, you may enjoy scrolling through all of my Cartier coverage on the blog HERE.

Titanium case…double balance spring…

What — did you think that I was going to let Thanksgiving 2010 go by without serving up something reeeeeeaaaaal nice to go with your turkey and gravy??? Of course not, so go ahead and feast your eyes on a first look at the new Audemars Piguet Millenary Minute Repeater (Reference 26371TI).  It is a remarkable watch is many ways.  The casual observer can appreciate the brushed titanium case/polished titanium bezel, the offset anthracite color dial that is marked by rose gold roman numerals, the visible escapement and contrasting small seconds subdial, and of course the minute repeater (aka it chimes on command).  The technically inclined may drool over the manual wind AP Caliber 2910 movement, which I’ll lay out some details on below….

Audemars Piguet Millenary Minute Repeater

47mm x 42mm titanium case, anthracite grey dial, applied pink gold numerals, minute repeater slide activator (at 7 o’clock), black croc leather strap with titanium “AP” buckle

Manufacture Audemars Piguet Hand Wound Caliber 2910 Movement

flat double balance-spring (no Breguet overcoil), 165 hour power reserve from 2 barrels, third barrel powering the minute repeater, , 21,600 vph (3hz) frequency, 443 parts in total

a closer look of the Caliber 2910

Wait a minute…

This is 1 of 2 “pre-SIHH 2011″ releases from Baume & Mercier – the Classima Automatic Jumping Hour (Ref 10039).  It is a sharp looking watch, but I must confess I am a bit confused.  After all this watch looks eerily similar to the $19,900 Baume & Mercier William Baume Jumping Hour (Ref M0A08857) watch I wrote about this past August.  While I’m pretty sure the Classima Jumping Hour watch you see here does not cost $19,900, I’m kinda wondering why the “William Baume Jumping Hour” version does!  OK, sure one is steel and one is red gold, but what else?  Did B&M ditch the “William Baume” concept in favor of this?  Unfortunately the press release from the brand does nothing to clarify this matter.  Further clarification is needed…please.

Baume & Mercier Automatic Jumping Hour (Ref 10039)

Limited Edition of 500 (numbered), available Fall 2011

42mm steel case, automatic mechanical Dubois Depraz 14400 movement, black alligator strap

close up of the nice dial

Go, Zenith, go!

Zenith continues to reinforce my notion that it can again be taken seriously (Bye-bye Defy).  Starting last year with the impressive 1/10th Second Chrono, Zenith has been focused on nicely designed watches that reinforce the core heritage of the brand.  Of course, it’s desire for a bit of flair to demonstrate its technical prowess still exists, too — a la the Zenith Christophe Colombe I showed a few months back, but it is clear that the focus is back to the brand’s strong heritage.  And for that, Zenith is becoming LOVED again!

Anyway, this new El Primero Tourbillon definitely caught my eye — sharp looking watch, eh?  Price is $49,700 for the steel version and $66,800 for the 18k rose gold version.

Zenith El Primero Tourbillon

44 mm rose gold or stainless steel case, comes on alligator leather strap lined with rubber

Steel version:

The Zenith El Primero 4035 D movement with 60-second tourbillon is visible through the caseback:

You can see what a couple of my fellow watch bloggers thinkg about this watch, HERE (Ariel Adams) and HERE (Jason Pitsch/PW).

More Zenith watches I have covered, HERE.

Great video…

Hodinkee’s recent run down of the AP Caliber 2120 caught my attention last week and I wanted to follow it up with some more looks at this spectacular movement and the watches it sits inside — the new Audemars Piguet “Jules Audemars Extra Thin” and Extra Thin Perpetual Calendar models.  Actually, Audemars Piguethas produced a very good video which does just this — points out the finer details of the movement — so I’ll let it do the talking.  Enjoy a few pics of the watch, too.

Audemars Piguet Caliber 2120 Overview Video

Audemars Piguet Caliber 2120

28.4mm diameter, 2.45mm thick, 214 components, 19,800 frequency, nicely decorated!

Audemars Piguet Jules Audemars Extra Thin Watches

41mm pink gold case, silver (Ref 15180OR.OO.A088CR.01) or black (Ref 15180OR.OO.A002CR.01) dial,

Finally, here’s a look at the perpetual calendar model (also available in brown dial) — it is the Caliber 2120 with the perpetual calendar module on top of it (again, I encourage you to read Hodinkee’s post for the comparison):

It’s a good week for watches, my friends!

Panerai PAM 386, Vacheron Constantin Quai de l’Ile Annual Calendar, and now this from Girard-Perregaux! I was reallly pleased with Girard-Perregaux’s 2010 offerings at the SIHH in Geneva, and if this new 1966 Small Seconds is any indication of what is to come from GP in Geneva in 2011, it will undoubtedly be another good year for the brand!  My only question about this watch is, what’s not to like?

Girard Perregaux 1966 Small Seconds

40mm white or rose gold case, white enamel dial, Girard Perregaux automatic Caliber 3300 (new movement), alligator strap with matching buckle

In case you are wondering why the “SIHH 2011″ notation in the title, it is because these watches are all special previews of the new watches that will be released by several of the major watch brands in January 2011 at a show called the “Salon International de la Haute Horlogerie” — SIHH, for hort.  If you want to see what happens at the exclusive, “invitation only” event held in Geneva in January, just check out Perpetuelle.com’s 2009 and 2010 coverage of one of the hottest watch events in the world.  And rest assured, we’ll be in full force come January 2011 – You won’t want to miss the action!