COMPRISING INDICATORS THAT CONTINUOUSLY TRACE AN ARC BEFORE JUMPING BACK TO THE START, RETROGRADE DISPLAYS BRING BURSTS OF ENERGY TO THESE FRESH FACES.
COMPRISING INDICATORS THAT CONTINUOUSLY TRACE AN ARC BEFORE JUMPING BACK TO THE START, RETROGRADE DISPLAYS BRING BURSTS OF ENERGY TO THESE FRESH FACES.
It’s not just a flying tourbillon that gives IWC’s Portugieser Tourbillon Mystere Retrograde a sense of dynamism: This 44.2mm platinum timepiece also features a retrograde date display on the bottom left of its dial, which jumps back to its starting position at the end of every month. (In shorter months, the date can be easily and quickly adjusted with its rapid-advance system).
Retrograde displays are typically energy-intensive because of the sudden bursts of power required to drive them – not a problem with this model’s mighty seven-day power reserve.
BARRELLOOK INTO THE MIRROR
When A. Lange Sohne created the Lange 1 Daymatic, the company differentiated it from the regular Lange 1 by making it the latter’s mirror image. For example, the Daymatic’s hour-and-minute display is on the right of the dial, instead of the left. Similarly, the Daymatic’s retrograde day-of-the-week scale mirrors the position of the power reserve indicator on the Lange 1. We like the characteristic attention to detail that’s shown in this 39.5mm pink gold watch.
LEAPS OF IMAGINATION
ON THE MOVE
POWER OF FOUR
The dial of the Longines Master Collection Retrograde serves up quite the show of hands, with no fewer than four retrograde displays: There’s one for the day of the week, the date, the seconds and the second time zone. Despite the six hands sharing space on this space, this 41mm rose gold watch remains relatively legible, thanks to its clearly defined scales and the contrast of its blued steel hands against a silver dial.
FAST TRACK
Retrograde displays can be used to indicate various things: Seconds, minutes, hours, days, and so on. Typically, the seconds retrograde display is the fastest-moving, jumping back to the start every 60 seconds. But the retrograde seconds hand of Blancpain’s Villeret Retrograde Small Seconds (Ref. 6653Q-3462-55B) moves even faster than that, returning to the start every 30 seconds. This feature lends a fun, dynamic touch to the otherwise classically styled wristwatch, shown here in a 40mm red gold case.
