Baselworld 2018 Bvlgari Octo Finissimo Tourbillon Automatic sets New watchmaking records for world’s thinnest self-winding watch ever and world’s thinnest tourbillon timepiece

Just slightly over a month ago, Piaget announced to the world a record breaking ultra-thin calibre ( Altiplano Ultimate Automatic 910P with records for the thinnest mechanical watch ever and the thinnest automatic watch) and it looks like for Baselworld 2018 Bvlgari has gone and smashed that ultra-thin record with the new Octo Finissimo Tourbillon Automatic. The new Automatic movement equipped with a Tourbillon follows the Octo Finissimo Tourbillon in 2014, the Octo Finissimo Minute Repeater in 2016 and last year’s Octo Finissimo Automatic: At just 3.95mm thick, Octo Finissimo Tourbillon Automatic claims a new watch industry record for the fourth time and more amazingly, it does what its 2014 ultra-thin tourbillon predecessor could not do; it breaks the record for thinnest tourbillon watch held by Audemars Piguet’s Ultra Thin Automatic Tourbillon Caliber 2870.

While Piaget’s SIHH 2018 Altiplano “cheats” by literally integrating the movement into the timepiece using the caseback as its main plate, Bvlgari’s latest Octo Finissimo Tourbillon automatic’s BVL 288 movement is still independently set into the case

Baselworld 2018 Bvlgari Octo Finissimo Tourbillon Automatic sets New Thin Record

Working on the basis of the Finissimo Tourbillon movement launched in 2014, Bvlgari had to use their considerable expertise to find technical solutions in the overall construction in order to achieve this ultra-thin watchmaking record for the new Octo Finissimo Tourbillon Automatic. Bvlgari’s latest Haute Horlogerie achievement is made possible thanks to the breakthroughs in the new manufacture Calibre BVL 288 which handles automatic winding via an innovative peripheral oscillating weight, made of white gold and aluminium, positioned on the back of the movement. The contrast density of the two metals ingeniously enables the circular weight to oscillate in an efficient manner despite its minuitive thinness while the flying tourbillon eschews the traditional gear train and is equipped with a ballbearing system instead contributing to the reduced thickness. What is particularly noteworthy is that while Piaget’s SIHH 2018 Altiplano “cheats” by literally integrating the movement into the timepiece using the caseback as its main plate, Bvlgari’s latest Octo Finissimo Tourbillon automatic’s BVL 288 movement is still independently set into the case and then covered with a caseback – what a marvel.

Measuring just 1.95mm thick and endowed with a 52-hour power reserve, Calibre BVL 288 Finissimo is housed in a sandblasted titanium case revealing the entirely openworked skeleton movement, another technical feat, given that ultra-thin movements already have to endure compromised structural rigidity and the removal of additional material from support structures like plates and bridges only serve to exacerbate the challenges.

Nevertheless, the latest Baselworld 2018 Bvlgari Octo Finissimo Tourbillon Automatic is a triumph of not just Bvlgari’s fine watchmaking expertise but also the maison’s deft take on engineering aesthetics. Its complex, multi-faceted, finely structured case draws strength and beauty from design while ridges and angles create light effects and perspectives that signature of the Bvlgari Octo Finissimo’s modern character.

While the new  Bvlgari Octo Finissimo Tourbillon Automatic is powerfully expressed through the audacious overturning of a recent record by a watchmaking maison with decades more heritage than the Italian maison, Bvlgari proves once more at Baselworld 2018 that the slimness of a watch is based on an ability, unconstrained by rules which allows one to rethink, redesign and remodel volumes. It is a global approach relating to all elements of the watch, meaning the case and bracelet as well as each movement component. Bvlgari has chosen an ultra-contemporary material, titanium, to guarantee a combination of sturdiness and lightness. In just 3.95 millimetres, the Bvlgari Octo Finissimo Tourbillon Automatic redefines the frontiers of Haute Horlogerie.

50-piece limited edition Bvlgari Octo Finissimo Tourbillon Automatic Price and Specs

Movement Manufacture skeleton automatic Calibre BVL 288 with 52 hours power reserve.
Case 42mm sandblasted titanium with 30 metres water resistance
Bracelet Sandblasted titanium bracelet
Price CHF 120,000

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