Czapek & Cie. – ANTARCTIQUE Tourbillon – Secret Alloy 10th Anniversary Edition 2025
CZAPEK & CIE UNVEILS THE LIMITED 50-PIECE ANTARCTIQUE Tourbillon EDITION
Czapek & Cie introduces the Antarctique Tourbillon, driven by the new in-house Calibre 9 with a flying tourbillon regulator. The watch features a dramatic new guilloché pattern on the dial – the ‘Singularité’, and a striking architecture. This launch marks the beginning of the 10th anniversary year since the revival of Czapek & Cie, which coincides with the 180th anniversary of the namesake watchmaking Maison founded in 1845 by François Czapek, whose spirit continues to guide the company today.
Our collectors are always asking us ‘what’s next?’ with the Antarctique,” explains Czapek CEO Xavier de Roquemaurel. “After the Rattrapante, we decided to take a perhaps unexpected direction: creating a new and sophisticated expression of a two-century-old regulator: the tourbillon. Our starting point was, as always, to play with the clash between legacy and avant-gardism and this new in-house tourbillon calibre is the outcome.”
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Taking advantage of the form of the new tourbillon, Czapek has introduced a daring movement architecture with slender bridges revealing the beauty of the underlying mechanics and coupled it with a dial that harnesses classical métiers d’art in a new and contemporary ‘vortex-style’ guilloché design.
The new in-house Calibre 9: defined by purity of line
Reflecting Czapek’s unwavering pursuit of Beauty, the purity of the mechanism became the main design driver for the new in-house movement, Czapek Calibre 9. The fundamental principle was that that the three key elements – tourbillon, gear train and barrel – should be revealed on the dial side, perfectly aligned on the vertical axis and appearing as airy and light as possible.
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The open-worked flying tourbillon appears to hover between the main plate and dial, directly connected to the gear train, which floats in the centre of the dial beneath an extremely long and finely curved minutes bridge. The barrel dominates the upper section of the dial, floating in an aperture beneath an open-worked bridge.
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Our pursuit of aesthetics drives us to create mechanical beauty,” says Xavier de Roquemaurel. “It’s an iterative process, where changing a line changes both mechanics and aesthetics, which can lead to an intense ping-pong between the constructor-engineer and the designer-artist …with me playing the wild card in the middle.”
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The result is amplified by great visual depth, with curves and convex surfaces complemented by slender bridges; all angles are hand-polished and the top arms of the tourbillon cage are satin-polished, creating fascinating plays of light and shadow.
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The new calibre also testifies to significant technical prowess from the new geometry for the tourbillon, which dictated a finely machined convex titanium cage, to the anticlockwise crown wheel that required the development of a new proprietary toothing.
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Calibre 9 is the first Czapek calibre not only designed, conceived and constructed in-house but also machined mostly in-house. However, as Xavier de Roquemaurel points out, this does not signify a wish for full vertical integration. Emphasising that Czapek will always defend the principle of établissage, he explains: “We want freedom – hence the capacity to produce elements in-house. But we don’t want to make everything ourselves; for us, freedom also means the ability to choose and collaborate with the best specialist partners in any given area. That is what enables us to maintain agility and independence.” He also points out the invaluable sense of ‘family’ among the Maison’s regular partners. “These values are deeply embedded in the philosophy underlying our 10th anniversary celebration and our future,” he says.
The mechanics and aesthetics: an immutable bond
To amplify the beauty of the mechanics,
Czapek called on Metalem, with whom Czapek has been collaborating since
the beginning, to develop a new, trompe l’oeil guilloché design. The result is a dramatic vortex effect, giving the impression of infinite depth.
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Czapek has named the new pattern Singularité – from the astronomical term singularity, meaning those places in the universe where the standard laws of physics break down, making space and time infinite and undifferentiated – best exemplified by black holes.
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The
pattern may look deceptively simple but is very difficult to execute:
unlike a classical guilloché pattern, in which the guillocheur cuts
lines at different angles that always start from a single point, in
Singularité, the starting point moves with each passage of the lathe.
Enhancing the purity of the mechanical structure and the infinity effect of the guilloché, the hour markers are not set on the dial but are part of the flange. The bridges – including the soaring curve of the gear train bridge – are integrated to the main plate through the guilloché dial plate.
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Since its very beginning, Czapek has always liked to offer collectors a certain freedom of personalization, so that they can wear a watch that's just like them. That's why, the Antarctique Tourbillon will be offered in a choice of three dial colours: Glacier Blue, Photon Sphere (a 5N gold hue) and the mythical grey Secret Alloy, a limited-edition of 50 pieces. All iterations will be proposed in stainless steel.
Redesigning the case: an ode to transparency and curves
The case has been redesigned to echo the curvilinear aesthetic of the mechanism and dial. Taking the curved glass box principle of the Antarctique Rattrapante as the starting point, the front and back sapphire crystals have been subtly raised. On the reverse side, this creates the impression that there is no bezel and, indeed, the engravings that would normally appear on a caseback bezel are done inside the crystal by metallisation – executed in mirror style so as to read ‘true’ from the outside.
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To amplify the trompe l’oeil effect and create the impression that it is floating in the air, the surface of the gold winding rotor is also convex. Moreover, Michèle Rothen, Czapek’s cherished independent master engraver, hand-engraved it with a black-hole-inspired pattern similar to the guilloché Singularité.
The Antarctique Tourbillon will be available for pre-order at the
brand’s authorised dealers worldwide, the boutique in Geneva at rue de
la Corraterie 18, and at Czapek.com.
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About Czapek & Cie
François
Czapek was a Czech-born Polish watchmaker who fled to Geneva in 1832
after fighting in the Polish uprising. He immediately started his own
atelier and in 1839 entered into a partnership with Antoine Norbert de
Patek, introducing him to the world of watchmaking. In 1845, at the end
of their partnership, he created Czapek & Cie and achieved
considerable success. He became the official watchmaker of Napoleon III
and opened, what was most likely the first watchmaking boutique on the
Place Vendome in Paris.
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TECHNICAL CHARACTERISTICS
Case
Material: Stainless steel
Diameter: 40.50 mm
Height: 11.50 mm
Sapphire crystal glass box with anti-reflective treatment on the inner side
Sapphire case back glass box with antireflective treatment on the inner side
Water-resistant to 50 meters
Dial and hands
– Secret Alloy
- Hand-guilloche, registered ‘Singularity’ dial in 401 ‘Secret Alloy’ original grey colour
- Blued hour-markers with Superluminova
- Blued hands with Superluminova
– Glacier Blue
- Hand-guilloché, registered ‘Singularity’ dial in 401 ‘Secret Alloy’ with PVD-made Glacier Blue hue
- Blued hour-markers and hands with Superluminova
- Rhodium-plated hour-markers and hands as a made-to-order option
– Photon Sphere
- Hand-guilloche, registered ‘Singularity’ dial in 401 ‘Secret Alloy’ with PVD-made 5N gold hue
- Rhodium-plated hour-markers and indexes with Superluminova
- Blued hour-markers and hands as a made-toorder option
Movement
Calibre 9: Czapek manufacture tourbillon movement, mechanical with automatic winding
Diameter: 32.4mm
Height: oscillating weight/bottom dials 3.79mm
oscillating weight/centre bridge 7mm
Number of parts: 191
Number of jewels: 20
Swiss lever escapement, variable inertia balance (8mg per cm²) via 4 gold inertia weights
Frequency: 3 Hz, 21’600 vph
Hand-engraved 5N gold oscillating weight
Power reserve of 72 hours
Finishes
Openwork ratchets, sandblasted, blackened, satin-finished and hand-bevelled bridges, six inward angles
Functions
Hours, minutes & 60 seconds flying tourbillon
Strap and buckle
Integrated stainless steel bracelet with Czapek
Exclusive ‘Easy Release’ system and microadjustment device
Additional rubber strap
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Press Release - 2025
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Czapek & Cie – 2, Rue Saint-Léger, 1205 Genève Suisse
Contact presse: Valeria Garavaglia Pedroni
Email: valeria@czapek.com | jane@czapek.com (UK)
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