A boutique watchmaker is setting a new standard with the world’s thinnest mechanical watch. Find out why this weird watch costs $1.8 million.
It’s oddly shaped, doesn’t look like a watch, and costs more than many actual Ferraris. The new partnership between Swiss luxury watchmaker Richard Mille and Ferrari resulted in a mechanical watch they call the world’s thinnest.
At just 1.75mm thick, the Ferrari RM UP-01 beats Bulgari, which released a 1.80mm watch earlier this year called the Finissimo Ultra.
The RM UP-01 is also capable of withstanding acceleration over 5,000 Gs, according to the hype. It weighs only 2.82g and has a 45-hour power reserve.
visual appeal
The visual design, however, is a bit… odd. For something that costs about five times the average price of an American home, it looks like you could build it with parts from an assembly kit. Yet, this may be deliberate. Both companies wrote in their post that the watch is intended for practical use.
Like Ferrari wrote on his site“Just as form follows function for every prancing horse, here too there has been a new approach to horological mechanics in which technicality dictates aesthetics more than ever. In other words, it is not a centerpiece is a watch where each component is designed for everyday use.
If the idea of a $1.8 million watch designed for “everyday wear” sounds a bit silly, you’re not alone. The watch experts from A blog to watch didn’t hesitate to make fun of the RM UP-01.
“It’s hard to see exactly how the Richard Mille RM UP-01 Ferrari is a Ferrari watch, other than having that iconic logo placed in an otherwise unused space on the bezel and having Ferrari Formula 1 drivers modeling the room for photos,” the post wrote earlier today.
A technical feat
As a proof of concept, the RM UP-01 is technologically interesting. The precision and workmanship on display here is worthy of an arthouse like Ferrari. And lest we sound like Luddites, we appreciate companies that push technical boundaries.
But as with most hyper-luxury fashion watches (especially those associated with automotive companies), this watch is so impractical it makes your head spin like the back tires of a Testarossa.
And think about it: for the sake of barely being able to tell the time, you could open two Starbucks Authorized locations or have your name engraved on the cornerstone of a brand new library.
And if you’re still interested, well, good luck. Because with only about 30m of water resistance, your very expensive and very limited watch (which you have to wind with a screwdriver, it seems) will disintegrate if subjected to anything other than a knockdown occasional champagne.
Put the pedal to the bottom if you want one: Richard Mille will only produce 150 in total.
If you don’t have $1.8 million, but you want real prancing horse gear, remember: you can buy real vintage Ferrari for less than $100,000.
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