Blancpain watch in honor of the Year of the Rat

The new model, whose debut coincides with the advent of the Year of the Rat, is not exactly dedicated to rodents…

After five years in production, the Blancpain Traditional Chinese Calendar timepiece is equipped with an incredible mechanism that allows the display of Chinese and Gregorian calendar elements. More complicated than the perpetual calendar, the self-winding 3638 mechanism possesses an ingenious combination of two radically different representations of time and is a striking technical achievement. Moreover, while the Gregorian calendar is based on a solar day, the Chinese relies on the lunar cycle - one solar year is about 11 days longer than a year consisting of twelve lunar months. In addition, the Chinese calendar has a leap every two or three years to bring consistency into the seasonal cycle, which explains the variation in the date of the Chinese New Year celebration.

Creating a watch that reconciles all these complexities is one of the reasons why the Blancpain Traditional Chinese Calendar model stands out from all others created in this honor. The second reason is quite simple: it has no rodents on his dial.

Instead, its Grand Feu enameled dial contains a harmonious quintet of temporal views, while the rat subtly peers inside the window at the twelve o'clock position. Just below it is a double hour counter, which shows us both the numbers and the symbols, respecting the Chinese system of dividing the day into twelve double hours. At the 3 o'clock position, 10 celestial pillars and 5 elements are shown, while on the other side of the dial, at the nine o'clock position, we can see pointers showing the month and date.

Just above the six o'clock position, we can see a display of the moon phase, which indicates the current month of the Chinese calendar. In addition, we must emphasize that this mechanism has an energy reserve of seven days and is housed in a platinum housing with a diameter of 45 mm. Only fifty of these models will be created, with a price tag of $ 87,800.

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