A Sotheby’s New York auction house recently sold one of their Chopard watches alongside a Patek Philippe automatic repeating perpetual calendar tonneau for $461, 000 (£266, 000). The watch, an 18 carat white gold and diamond Chopard Limited Edition Tourbillon was sold at the final watch and clock auction of the spring season at the New York auction house.
Approximately six years old, the Chopard Tourbillon has a dial covered with over 300 baguette-cut diamonds, exceeding a total of 27 carats. One of 25 18 carat white gold and diamond Tourbillons produced, this watch is a magnificent and rare work of art that is truly beyond compare.
The hand-wound mechanical movement invokes Chopard’s illustrious heritage, a maintenance of the traditional methods of horological mastery, proving that there is such beauty in tradition and elegant simplicity. What’s more, the Tourbillon operates at a frequency of 4Hz, or 28, 800 vibrations per hour, making it one of the most accurate watches in the world, as well one of the most stunning. A total of 224 moving parts perpetuate this unerring accuracy, such complexity integral to the precision of the timepiece, and yet represented in the spartan simplicity of the bladed royal blue hands.
The sheer brilliance of the diamonds is 
tempered by the glareproof scratch-resistant sapphire crystal glass, more than just a viewing window but a work of art itself. The most precise movements are protected by the finest in glasswork, which in turn is encased by the finest in white gold, a 43 mm case of 18 carats of unparalleled brilliance, beauty, and durability. The 18 carat white gold crown sits proudly atop this spectacular case, a kingmaker on the wrist. On the reverse, the sapphire crystal exhibition case back allows the owner to view the extraordinary craftsmanship and precision engineering that has gone into this timepiece; the true value of the Tourbillon is both without and within.
The Tourbillon is affixed to the wrist with a black alligator leather strap and alligator brown lining, intricately woven with sewn matching tones, clasping with an 18 carat white gold buckle at the base.
In every detail the Chopard Tourbillon is a master class of horology, an exquisite creation of magnanimous beauty, radiating an opulence of laissez-faire idiosyncrasy, bound by nothing and endlessly individual.
It is no surprise that such a superior watch garnered such attention at the auction. In a day that saw $7.1 million taken, this watch accounted for over 7% of the total sales, continuing Chopard’s unmatched tradition of excellence.
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