Every year for the past four years, I’ve had the privilege of attending Concours d’Elegance at Pebble Beach to see and photograph Bugatti’s latest super car along with a matching watch or two from long time horological partner Parmigiani Fleurier.
Unlike last year when Bugatti unveiled the Chiron, a brand new car with a new chassis and a more aggressive design as the successor to its highly successful and fast Veyron; this year Bugatti unveiled the Divo which it claims is inspired from its years creating coach building models in the 1920s and early 1930s.
To understand the Divo is to understand what they mean by coach building. The car is essentially a Chiron "dressed up" with a über aggressive, super light, and more aerodynamic shell. Looking at it live you’d think it came straight from Back to the Future part II, modernized for today.
And, to be clear, it’s not just a Chiron with a pretty dress. The Divo delivers new levels of performance, especially for curvy roads, that I bet every Chiron owner have yet to need with their models. But that's the Bugatti way, pushing engineering to it's limits. The car is 77 lbs lighter, 0.1 second faster to 60 mph, and does the Nardò handling circuit lap 8 seconds faster than the Chiron already record-breaking figures.
So what did Parmigiani deliver to keep up with Bugatti’s relentless pursuit of mechanical engineering perfection. Well, they’ve done the same. Reusing their Type 390 base model done for the Chiron, they’ve produced a driver watch that is also lighter in an engraved and polished titanium case, with carbon fiber laterals inserts, includes a tourbillon, with an Hermès baby blue strap matching the interior of the Divo, and 80 hours of power reserve whose display mimics the fuel gauge of the Divo.
On wrist it's easy to wear due to light weight. And with its 12 degrees of rotation on the main movement axis, it will perfectly wrap most wrist, like the Divo or Chiron leather buckets will wrap your body. For me it's simply an extension of the emotion that a Divo gives upon glance, but instead on your wrist. And unlike the limited production for the Divo of just 40 exemplars (all sold out), this one is a piece unique. However Parmigiani is happy to create a bespoke version of the Bugatti Type 390 watch made for the Chiron, customize to match your car, your tastes, and be unique to you.
This unique model from Parmigiani takes their Bugatti watch platform to it’s own mechanical perfection. Priced at $350,000, the watch (if not sold) can be purchased at Parmigiani's only boutique in the USA at the Miami Design District or the other ones in London or in Paris. And since you cannot buy a Divo, perhaps getting this watch is the next best thing, unless you want to wait for the next Bugatti unveiling.
The boys from Brooklyn are back with their (now annual) watch fair event in the heart of San Francisco: Wind^Up. Using the same location as last year, Zach, Blake, and the rest of the Worn & Wound crew managed to assemble 30+ plus watch brands to show their novelties and in some cases new watches being introduced for the first time at the fair.