by Elizabeth Doerr

On September 17, 2015 Vacheron Constantin presented a milestone in the history of timekeeping: Reference 57260, the world’s most complicated portable timepiece to date.

On October 29, 2015 the three watchmakers who spent eight years of their lives creating this masterpiece received a very special award: Jean-Luc Perrin and brothers Micke and Yannick Pintus were called to the Grand Théâtre’s stage to accept the Special Jury prize at the 2015 Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève.

Reference 57260 by Vacheron Constantin

Under the aegis of Vacheron Constantin’s bespoke watch division, Atelier Cabinotiers, which offers connoisseurs the chance to commission a custom-made watch according to their own tastes and designs (within the boundaries of the brand’s style), Reference 57250 came into being containing 57 functions, some of which had never before been seen in a timepiece.

The day that Reference 57260 was introduced was obviously a very special one for the Geneva manufacture. And to commemorate it, Vacheron Constantin released a very special film called “The Witnesses.”

We invite you to view it here.

For the full story on this epoch-making timepiece, please see Vacheron Constantin’s Reference 57260 Is The Most Complicated Portable Watch In The World.

Quick Facts
Case: white gold, double-sided displays; 98 x 50.55 mm
Caliber: manually wound Caliber 3750, 71 x 36 mm, Geneva seal, 60 hours power reserve, 2,601 individual components, with pallet lever and escape wheel in diamond-coated silicon with diamond pallets within a tri-axial tourbillon
Functions: 57 functions aside from the regulator-style hours, minutes, and seconds including perpetual calendar with moon phases, leap year, zodiac sign, season, equinox and solstice and age of moon, Hebraic perpetual calendar including displays of the century, decade and Yom Kippur, astronomical calendar with celestial sky chart and sidereal indications, grande and petite sonnerie with silencer and night mode, alarm with choice of one or Westminster gong, power reserve displays for chime and movement, display of alarm torque and alarm power reserve, equation of time, display of sunrise/sunset calibrated to location of owner, double retrograde split-seconds chronograph, second time zone with day/night indication, world time, length of day, length of night, perpetual ISO calendar for display of calendar weeks
Limitation: unique piece
Price: not disclosed, estimated in the tens of millions of dollars