At the Dubai Watch Week 2021 we had the chance to see the Bovet Battista Tourbillon, the next milestone of the brand’s collaboration with Pininfarina. The co-designed model is inspired by Pininfarina’s Battista GT Hyper Car.
At the 2018 Formula E race in Rome, Pininfarina (owned by the Mahindra Group) announced a new car making division, called Automobili Pininfarina. Although they have been responsible for some of the most beautiful car designs since their inception in 1930, Pininfarina has not undertaken creating cars up until now. Their first, a full electric hypercar debuted at the 2019 Geneva Motor Show and was named after Battista ‘Pinin’ Farina. Automobili Pininfarina teamed with Rimac on the drivetrain which delivers an unbelievable performance: 1877 horsepower, 2300 Nm torque, 0-100 km/h in less than 2.0 sec, 0-300 km/h under 12 sec and a 350 km/h top speed. With the 120kwh battery pack, its single charge range is 500km. Thanks to the raw performance, Pininfarina’s own tuning of the powertrain and the design, the vehicle promises a unique driving experience. As it should be, it is dressed up in an unmistakably Italian style conceived by the pen of Luca Borgogno, Chief Design Officer of Automobili Pininfarina.
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Luca Borgogno, Chief Design Officer of Automobili Pininfarina
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Bovet Battista Tourbillon on the wrist of Luca Borgogno, Chief Design Officer of Automobili Pininfarina during the Dubai Watch Week
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At the Dubai Watch Week 2021, Mr Borgogno and Mr Keith Strandberg, Head of Communication of Bovet presented the Bovet Battista Tourbillon to us. The lively collaboration between Bovet and Pininfarina has already been going on for years, but this is the first with the car making division founded in 2018.
‘We have had a truly creative and collaborative designing process when drawing up the Bovet Battista Tourbillon’ – says the car designer responsible for packaging the latest technology into the sensually curved sports car shape. ‘We took the characteristic motifs of the Battista GT, but then focused on building a wristwatch around the technical content of the watch movement. The calibre itself was created from the ground up by Bovet to fit the desired functionality and design the best.’
Unusually for Bovet, the dial is asymmetric. The sub-dials are shaded from a lighter blue to the Battista’s Iconica Blu colour, which are repeated on the accents – the hands, the tourbillon cage, the hoop of the indexes and the screws on the back. The time is shown by the central hands, while the actual state of the 10-days running reserve is shown in the sub-dial at 9 o’clock. Date is in the large aperture in the other sub-dial. The wheels, bridges and parts of the movement stand in cool contrast with the blue details.
The beautiful 60-second flying tourbillon can be observed through the sapphire crystal on both sides. The balance wheel operates at 2.5 Hz, releasing the energy from the single barrel in 10 days. Bovet’s patented spherical differential mechanism helps multiply the winding motion to speed up the process. The architecture of the skeletonized movement, especially the bridges on the back are directly inspired by the lines of the Battista GT. The strap is made of vegan rubber.
A nod to the 90-year heritage of Pininfarina, the shape of the sub-dials and the black bridge refer to the anniversary. Additionally, the Bovet Battista Tourbillon will be available in a 90-piece limited edition: 30 in titanium, 30 in red gold and 30 in platinum.
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Bovet Battista Tourbillon - E-heart and winding system
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Photo credits: Bovet, Automobili Pininfarina, Loupiosity.com.
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