Is it still possible to manufacture a pure ladies’ watch? Is this still possible without falling into the eternal so-called female reductions of male models? Women know what they want, and even better, what they don’t want. And for Pia de Chefdebien, what women desire, God ordains!
Joël A. Grandjean, JSH® Magazine & Swiss Watch Passport’s editor in chief & publisher
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Watchmakers can be a bit devious. For behind the so-called unisex trend or the self-righteous attitude of de-gendering often in fact lies the colossal economic power of small Asian wrists. As a result, genuine ladies’ watches today almost have to fight to claim their feminity.
Expectations harvested and fulfilled
No stone was left unturned when Philippe Belais, boss of ‘Claude Meylan’, asked his loyal team member Pia de Chefdebien to conceive a feminine timepiece. This watch brand, at ease in its “suissitude”, is a Combière of excellency whose distinctive identity runs through the assumed nakedness of the skeleton arts. Here, expectations were fully explored. And everything in the apparent simplicity of what would become the “Tortue Lady” exudes delicacy and refinement. Even in this half-transparency, which doesn’t show everything and deliberately keeps a few dark shadows.
Lighting up! The in-house caliber 7.75CM17, developed in collaboration with the renowned motor-maker TEC Ebauches from an ETA 2671 movement, allows its rotor to take a long-desired break from the road. By some magic that only master watchmakers can explain, this rotor swings out at 6 o’clock, as if freed from its constraints, as if infatuated with freedom. Its sunburst guilloché is filled with sparkle as it glides gracefully to and fro.
