Already before I started with the project I knew that I wanted to create a quite simple (time only) rectangular wristwatch. The only ad-on I would like to have was a tourbillon visible from both front and back of the watch. When in motion, this last feature is a very beautiful mechanism to observe. From the world of watches I was drawn by pieces from the early 20th century like the Rolex Prince models, the Patek Philippe Gondolo but also by the modern Cabaret from Lange & Söhne. The front of the watch had to be characterized by simple shapes and follow the principle of readability by avoiding too much information and killing the message: Timekeeping. The movement would only be visible by the tourbillon and the remaining aspect would be two hands and a smaller raised dial on top of an engine turned background. As for the backside, I went for a clear and simple but eye-catching look. I decided to make a gear train bridge that would cover most of the movement except the tourbillon, which would have a round skeletonized window giving a look in to the mechanism also from this side. When its making progressed, I chose to adopt the look of a rose window and as most of the parts where covered under the main bridge, I wanted this bridge to represent my level of finishing skill by making its internal shape intricate. In the after match, it proved to be the part that needs the most time to fabricate. For my prototype I did only make it to a basic level of finishing and the time spent on in was about 60 hours. For a perfect finishing with sharp corners, evenly polished bevels and overall shape completely symmetrical I estimate around 100 hours needed in total for this part.
