Baselworld Update: Girard-Perregaux Celebrates 225 Years with 225 Unique Pieces

One of 225 unique pieces made to honor the manufacture's founding.

What better homage than to celebrate 225 years of history with as many unique watches? The Girard-Perregaux manufacture underscores this special year with Girard-Perregaux Place Girardet, an exceptional and unprecedented collection. Each dial is notable for its original combination of decorations. And, for the very first time, the manufacture’s emblematic Pont d’or, soars above a Microvar balance wheel.

Thanks to a new automatic manufacture caliber, the opening below the Golden Bridge reveals the variable inertia Microvar balance. Each dial of this emblematic collection reveals a small golden plate engraved with a year between 1791 and 2016. At the center of the timepiece, a quote recalls a remarkable event of the year, starting with the founding date of Girard-Perregaux, in 1791. The manufacture refines further the personalization of each watch in this series with a different index style, minutes scale and its decoration: barley-corn or cross-weave basket guilloché with a satin or sandblasted finish. 

Integrated Manufacture 

The origins of Girard-Perregaux date back to 1791, when Jean-François Bautte produced his first timepieces. He set up a manufacture bringing together under one roof all the crafts of watchmaking. Rare for its time, this manufacture configuration still distinguishes Girard-Perregaux today and enables a perfect mastery of each step of a watch’s creation, with an extreme care vested even in the final hand finishing.

Place Girardet celebrating 1999.

Girard-Perregaux’s independence grants it total freedom for innovation. Proof is the 80+ patents its patrimony holds. The Girard-Perregaux Place Girardet series traces back the memorable moments of the manufacture’s extraordinary history. For example: in 1889, Girard-Perregaux won a gold medal at the Paris Universal Exhibition for its Tourbillon with Three Gold Bridges. Then, in 1966, the Maison presented the Gyromatic HF of 1966, first high-frequency movement with 36,000 vibrations per hour. In 2008, the Manufacture unveiled yet another revolutionary innovation, the Constant Escapement: a constant force escapement conceived under the physics principle of bowing, which had not yet been applied to watchmaking.

More recently, in 2009, Girard-Perregaux presented its new variable inertia balance, the Microvar, and embeded it in the Girard-Perregaux Place Girardet series movement. At the heart of a watch, the balance wheel divides the movement’s energy in equal portions - the famous “tick-tock.” An exclusive development, the Microvar balance entails six screws and two flyweights positioned on the rim of the balance wheel. This combination enables a finer adjustment of the energy regulation, thus improving precision in time measurement. In its 225-year history, Girard-Perregaux has consistently delivered watchmaking innovations in all fields of time measurement: design, complications or chronometry. 

The unique edition marking the 225th anniversary.

Unique Dials 

The face of the series models takes up the manufacture’s emblematic Golden Bridge. Situated at 6 o’clock, it stretches above the oscillations of the Microvar balance for the first time. On this edition, Girard-Perregaux alternates the colors, finishes, decorations of the dial and types of indexes. Depending on the period, the indexes also adopt different styles.

At 9 o’clock, the small golden plaque, mounted directly on the movement, appears on the face through a window. At the center, a quote emphasizes a relevant event of the year displayed: be it in Girard-Perregaux’s history or in horology’s, but also cultural, scientific or politically significant milestones. Thus, the year 1808, with its taupe dial and flamboyant guilloché, celebrates Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5. Or in the case of the 1963 model, a quote with a blue coarse sandblasted dial recounts the first woman’s flight in space.

Beginning with this 225th anniversary, this collection, as well as all future Girard-Perregaux’s creations, will display a new logo, which is labeled with the year 1791. On each of these unique dials, leaf-shaped hands, covered with luminescent material, indicate the passing of time. 

Visible Balance Wheel 

The sapphire crystal caseback reveals the caliber and its gold oscillating weight, which is also engraved with Girard-Perregaux’s founding year, 1791. The new GP01800-0005 automatic mechanical caliber constitutes an evolution of the manufacture movement GP01800. In this new development, with completely revamped architecture and design, Girard-Perregaux has moved the variable inertia Microvar balance to the dial side, creating an unprecedented animation.

The Microvar balance is visible on the dial.

The new GP01800-005 is made of 194 components. It displays the hours, minutes and a central second. It offers a power reserve of 54 hours. The manufacture’s artisans have decorated the movement with traditional techniques: Côtes de Genève on the main-plate and gear train bridges and even sunburst decoration on the oscillating weight. An eagle, a symbol of Girard-Perregaux since 1897 and a reference to the special Anniversary Edition, are also engraved on the movement.

In this anniversary year 2016, the Girard-Perregaux Place Girardet collection, a contemporary culmination of more than two centuries of horological expertise, pays as much homage to the manufacture’s history as to that of its crafts, since 1791.

The Girard-Perregaux Place Girardet case, in rose gold, boasts a 41mm diameter, and a height slightly less than 11 millimeters. The case and lugs extend into a black alligator strap, with a deployment buckle, also in rose gold. The watch is guaranteed water resistant to 30 meters. 

Place Girardet

Technical Specifications 

The Place Girardet commemorating 1860.

Case

Material: rose gold

Diameter: 41.00mm

Height: 10.89 mm high

Glass: sapphire anti-reflective

Caseback: sapphire crystal

Dial: 225 unique dials with applied or painted numbers/indexes. Dial design recalling a period of time between 1791 and 2016.

Hands: leaf-shaped

Water resistance: 30 metres (3 ATM) 

Movement 

Reference: GP01800-0005, mechanical with automatic winding

Diameter: 28.00 mm (131/4’’’)

Height: 3.80 mm

Frequency: 28,800 Vib/h – (4 Hz)

Number of components: 194

Jewels: 31

Power reserve: approximately 54 hours

Functions: hour, minute, central second

Strap 

Material: stitched black alligator

Buckle: rose-gold folding buckle