Thinnest Ever: Bulgari Octo Finissimo Minute Repeater

The Bulgari Octo Minute Repeater is already one of the stars of the fair – being a double world record holder as per the brand’s official message – and here are a few details about the piece. According to Bulgari, it is the thinnest manual winding minute repeater movement (3.12mm thick) and it might be the thinnest case (6.85mm) to contain such a complicated movement. Thanks to the prevalence of titanium here, this might just be the lightest minute repeater in the world too!

No doubt the decision to cast this watch in titanium will spark some debate, especially from hardliners who will question the virtue of eschewing a precious material. Other brands are joining Bulgari though in talking up the virtues of using titanium for sound quality… Below is the introduction from the press release, which you can use to draw your own conclusions while we digest the information.

Octo Finissimo Minute Repeater belongs to a proud line of ultra-thin watches developed by Bulgari. After the tourbillon and the mechanical hand-wound movement simultaneously launched in 2014, the Maison is laying a new milestone in the field of incomparably slim timepieces. The minute repeater remains to this day among the most complex of all horological complications and the exclusive preserve of a handful of prestigious brands.

A striking watch implies a number of specific construction constraints and full command of certain distinctive skills in order to achieve the best possible outcome: an intense, crystal-clear chime with a perfectly uniform and regular cadence when the mechanism is activated. While that might seem straightforward, it is anything but achieving this set of parameters calls for a rare and sophisticated breed of expertise and a degree of experience that very few watch brands can still claim to possess.

Moreover, these principles generally apply to striking watches that are large enough to provide sufficiently generous interior volumes enabling optimal diffusion of the sound within the case, and thus ensuring optimal acoustic quality. In the case of the Octo Finissimo Minute Repeater, everything was different right from the start, since the aim was to achieve perfect sound within the smallest possible space! The numbers speak for themselves: the in-house developed and produced BVL Calibre 362 measures just 3.12mm thick and the overall case thickness amounts to only 6.85mm.

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