During our visit to BaselWorld, we met with Ladoire Genève, an haute horlogerie brand that has been creating extraordinary time pieces since 2007. Their atypical collections feature cutting edge technology and sophisticated aesthetics.
Lionel Ladoire (the brand’s founder) and Richard Piras (Managing Director, Ladoire) first presented their prototypes in 2008, and saw an immediate response from stores specialized in haute couture watches and independent watchmaking.
There’s been no looking back since. Their latest creation, the Ladoire Roller Guardian Time – Blue, is a three-piece limited edition watch, endowed with a complex display of three cages mounted on ceramic micro ball bearings to show hours, minutes and seconds. Furthermore, an off-center GMT hand has been added to display an extra time zone. This hour hand can be rapidly adjusted by pushing down a corrector at the 2 o’clock mark. To set time, the watch has an additional crown positioned at 8 o’clock.
Developing this design has not been easy, and Ladoire needed to create a new caliber movement from scratch. The caliber Celvet/o1 movement has been patented as the H M S (Hours Minutes Seconds) Planetary complication. It is a black PVD-coated movement (39.5 x 29.5 x 9.3mm) with galvanic blue circular-geometry bridges and a micro rotor. The balance with screws is also coated with black PVD. It ticks at a low frequency of 18.000 beats per hour (equals 2.5herz) and has a power reserve of 48 hours.
The asymmetrical titanium watch case measures a whopping 56mm from left to right (9 – 3 o’clock) and 45mm from top to bottom (12 – 6 o’clock). Both bezel and case back have satin-brushed titanium finish and the center case has grey PVD on titanium coating. The correctors at 2 and 8 o’clock are both black PVD coated.
Although it’s hard to imagine you’d want to take this expensive beauty below sea-level, you can do so up to 50 meters. The denim blue alligator strap and double pin buckle in two-toned PVD coated grey titanium, are also suited to deep sea diving.
While the price for this particular model is still a secret, a regular Ladoire RGT retails for just over 100,000 USD. Expect this unique limited edition to be snapped up, despite the current economic climate.
Ladoire Roller Guardian Time Blue
