A three-axis tourbillon and minute repeater signed Hermès

During the last Watches and Wonders trade fair, held in Geneva in April 2024, Hermès surprised everyone with a watch featuring a central triaxial tourbillon and a minute repeater with a tuning fork as a gong. The brand’s identity is reflected in the gears, which are modelled on the wheels of the Duc Attelé, its emblem. With this watch, Hermès continues to explore the territory of grand complications. Interview with the man who knows it best: Philippe Delhotal, Creative Director of Hermès Horloger. Isabelle Cerboneschi

It was last April, at the Watches and Wonders trade fair in Geneva, on the Hermès pavilion. In the display cases were some of the company’s creations, including the Hermès Cut, the new model with a design that plays on both the circle and the round cut, as well as an abundance of fine craft timepieces, to the point where you might have thought you were at an artists’ collective vernissage. And in one showcase, a watch displayed its uniqueness with unbridled elegance. 

The first surprise: it was a model featuring a central three-axis tourbillon and a diapason-stamped minute repeater, a grand complication not immediately expected from Hermès. Second surprise: a tuning fork was used as a gong. Third surprise: the hammers were shaped like two horses’ heads. On the tourbillon cage, there was a double H, the same as that found on the lift in the Hermès boutique at 24 Faubourg. As for the gears, they were shaped like the wheels of the Duc Attelé, the Hermès emblem. 

In 1945, Émile-Maurice Hermès was looking for a logo. In his office, he had a pencil drawing, enhanced with gouache – ‘Duc attelé et groom à l’attente’ – by Alfred de Dreux, a famous 19th-century animal painter. And it was this art work that gave him the idea for one of the world’s best-known logos.

Philippe Delhotal tells us all, or almost all, about this watch that rings out the hours, quarters and minutes in such a unique way.

INTERVIEW

Hermès entered the world of haute horlogerie with the introduction of the Arceau Lift tourbillon in 2013. Is the launch of the Duc Attelé a way of saying that you intend to continue exploring this territory?

Philippe Delhotal : Our first tourbillon was indeed the Lift. At the time, it was quite a challenge for the company to launch a watch that explored the realm of haute horlogerie while showcasing the creativity and expertise of Hermès.

You had already created Le Temps Suspendu, which was a special complication.

It was our second watch that spoke of a singular approach to time. The first was called ‘Les Grandes Heures’ and offered a slightly different way of reading the hours, as if time were speeding up or slowing down at certain times of the day. Le Temps Suspendu, as its name suggests, suspended time.

Why would a watchmaker want to stop time?

Because when you’re a watchmaker, you don’t stop time. You count it, you divide it, you multiply it, but you never stop it. We decided to take a step to the side and allow it to be suspended so that the person who buys this watch can at some point escape and approach a stressful day with a different philosophy: get out of the box and give yourself some space.

Let’s go back to your first tourbillon. How was it different from the others?

In the end, it’s a fairly normal complication; almost all watch brands make tourbillons. To add an original touch, we used the double H on the lift of our flagship boutique at 24 rue du Faubourg Saint Honoré as the tourbillon cage. That’s why we called the watch Lift. It was our first grand complication.

Why did you choose to create more grand complications when this is an area where you were not expected?

It was a way of demonstrating our creativity coupled with technical performance. We had done the same thing with the métiers d’art. When we made the first métiers d’art watch in 2008, called Cape Cod Indian Dust, where we used grand feu enamel, we reproduced a Hermès scarf. We are a house of craftsmen, and we have a lot of drawings and colour. It would have been a shame not to use them. Haute Horlogerie is part of the same approach: the opportunity to express the richness of the company’s creations through exceptional timepieces.

Was that the only reason?

As a house of craftsmen, it’s important to us to demonstrate exceptional skills and interpret them in a different way with the Hermès tone and its singular approach to time, whether in terms of function or aesthetics. We developed this project thanks to the interest shown in it by a Japanese client. He wanted to see what a minute repeater coupled with a tourbillon, interpreted by Hermès, would look like.

What were the specific features of this first minute repeater that you presented in 2020?

We kept the code of the double H on the tourbillon cage of the Lift in order to personalise the movement. We had a little horse’s head engraved on the bridges. To show the movement from the outside, we cut a small crescent moon out of the dial. We then decided to create an opening in the shape of a horse’s head on the dial.

Does the Duc Attelé watch follow naturally from this model?

Yes, it did. Building on its success, we developed another movement with a triaxial tourbillon and a different striking mechanism. I asked the Cercle des Horlogers, who developed it, to make a minute repeater in 5 hertz, which is extremely precise and has an apparent timbre that no one had ever made. I used to be a musician. I played the clarinet, so I didn’t need a tuning fork, but my brother, who played the violin, used one. So why not try making a gong in the shape of a tuning fork? It gives a very particular sound, much more volume. We added a few Hermès touches with hidden details like the hammers and the rack in the shape of a horse’s head.

When I saw it at Watches and Wonders, I thought the tourbillon bridge was a double bass clef, as a nod to the tuning fork.

It’s the signature double H, which is made of titanium, but because it sits on a 360-degree tourbillon, it’s somewhat distorted. We created two models: one in titanium, because it’s a material that has good acoustics and reproduces sound best, with a dial grooved like the waves of sound, and another in pink gold with an aventurine dial.

How did you choose the sound of the tuning fork used as a timbre in the minute repeater?

The sound depends on the size of the case, its material, the diameter of the gong, its length and the space inside the watch. The propagation of sound will vary depending on whether a small or large gong is used. The surrounding material will either reduce or amplify the sound. For example, wood absorbs the sound whereas titanium does the opposite. The sound can only be discovered once the movement has been fitted. As with conventional gongs, the tuning fork is fixed by two screws from which it makes two turns. The watchmaker adjusts the sound by making small file strokes on the tuning fork, which modify the propagation of the sound. It was a first. We patented the tuning fork.

What was the market response?

We decided at the outset to produce two series of 24 pieces. All 48 were sold. We’ll probably bring this collection to life in the same way as we did with the Lift.

How long did it take you to develop this piece?

Three years. What our collector customers really liked was the simplicity of the object and the little details like the hammers and the rack in the shape of horse heads. It reflects the spirit of the company.

It’s truly a Hermès piece through and through. How do you go further without going too far?

It’s a question of balance. At some point you know you have to stop. It’s like a recipe: you need the right ingredients, a good recipe, then there’s experience and everything you can add or take away to make a perfect dish. At Hermès, we tend to take things out rather than add them in.

The wheels have a slightly steampunk, retro-futuristic aesthetic. Is this intentional?

It’s funny you should say that, because they remind me of the film Modern Times. I have the impression that I’m looking at something that isn’t a watch movement, but rather an interweaving of mechanisms. No doubt this is also linked to the fact that the sapphire crystal caseback allows you to see the whole fresco of mechanical parts and the two barrels facing each other. Two wheels have been moved for technical reasons, but we didn’t try to achieve a machine-like aesthetic result. A minute repeater comprises around 500 parts interacting in a space of just a few square centimetres. The visual result is quite impressive, while at the same time giving an impression of lightness.

Do you have any special anecdotes about this watch and how customers have perceived it?

We receive nothing but congratulations from our collectors. I went to Taiwan this summer and met a customer who was very interested in the Arceau Duc Attelé. He had a minute repeater on his wrist and wanted to compare the sound of his watch with ours. What interests customers is the product’s originality and reliability. What they come to Hermès for is the beauty of the object. We are storytellers.