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RECAPTURING THE ESSENCE OF TIME
THE SKULL KROME WATCH, HYT’S NEW EXTRAORDINARY AND UNPRECEDENTED CREATION, BREAKS ALL THE RULES. YOU DON’T NEED TO BE AN EXPERT TO APPRECIATE THE POWER OF ITS DESIGN. EVEN AT FIRST GLANCE THE SKULL KROME WATCH MAKES A STRIKING IMPRESSION, SIMPLY BECAUSE IT EPITOMISES AND AT THE SAME TIME BREAKS AWAY FROM EVERYTHING THAT HYT REPRESENTS. THIS UNIQUE WATCH IS PROVOCATIVE, CONTEMPORARY AND HAS A BOLD DESIGN SUPPORTED BY THE FLUID MECHANICS THAT HAVE BECOME THE BRAND’S SIGNATURE STYLE. THE SKULL KROME WATCH SPEAKS FOR ITSELF. ITS DEVELOPMENT, HOWEVER, WAS ANYTHING BUT OBVIOUS.
THE USE OF A CAPILLARY, WHICH CARRIES A FLUID TO ACT AS THE HOUR MARKER, IS A CONCEPT THAT IS ALREADY MASTERED BY HYT WATCHES AND ITS PARTNERS. HOWEVER, ANY SIGNIFICANT CHANGES IN FORM REQUIRE EXTENSIVE BACKGROUND WORK. FOR THE SKULL KROME WATCH, THE SKULL SHAPE OF THE TUBE, WHICH MEASURES LESS THAN ONE MILLIMETRE IN DIAMETER, WAS A SIGNIFICANT CHALLENGE IN ITSELF. THE ISSUE CENTRED ON THE CAPILLARY’S FOUR ANGLES, TWO OF WHICH ARE ALMOST 90° AT THE BASE. THESE CURVES MEANT THAT BENDING THE GLASS WAS A PARTICULARLY DELICATE TASK.
Technical specifications
Skull Krome
Functions: Blue retrograde fluidic hours, seconds, power reserve
Case: Titanium with brushed, micro-blasted and satin-finished finishes
- Diameter: 51 mm
- Height: 17.9 mm
- Black rubber coated screw-down crown
- Titanium dome at 6 o'clock
- Convex sapphire crystal with anti-reflective coating on the dial side
- Screw-down sapphire case-back
- Water resistant to 50 metres
Movement: Mechanical with manual winding, exclusive HYT calibre
- 28,800 Vph, 4 Hz, 35 jewels
- bridges hand-bevelled and adorned with Côtes de Genève
- 65-hour power reserve
HYT's exclusive patented micro-fluidic module:
- Two multi-layer metal bellows
- Capillary tube in medical grade glass, with interior nano-coating
- Two immiscible liquids; one transparent and the other coloured with a highly resistant dye
- Thermal compensator with dedicated bellow containing a special liquid
- Ceramic fluid restrictors
Dial: Unstructured, rhodium-plated with Clous de Paris stud pattern, fluid hour display
- Polished and rhodium finish Skull
- Grey hour dial and blue numerals
- Seconds indicator (left eye)
- Power reserve indicator (right eye)
Strap: White sail fabric, titanium deployant buckle
Ref.: 151-TT-46-BF-AW, Unique piece
Who's who
They are both as unpredictable and unruly as one another, and never happier than when the entire industry voices its doubts about their choices. In the end, what brings together Vincent Perriard and Laurent Picciotto is perhaps their insatiable curiosity, driving them where no-one else has even dreamed of going. Not merely out of a desire to be provocative, but simply from a constant yearning to liven up the art of watchmaking.
Even if it is always preferable to appraise a brand over time rather than judge it on the basis of a one-off, the power of its ambition can nonetheless be gauged by its first timepiece. At HYT, Vincent Perriard formed the opinion that traditional watch mechanisms might be all well and good, but that fluid mechanics were even better. This led to the idea of displaying the time using a liquid.
“Right from the start, when Vincent came to see me with this somewhat crazy idea, I found the approach to be very ingenious,” recalls Laurent Picciotto. “However, I immediately warned him against a merely stylistic exercise without any real future; he needed to display the genuine art of watchmaking – the only thing that could win him the esteem of his peers.”
For its co-founder, the practical outworking of this advice for the up-and-coming brand was to develop a purebred watch mechanism – a genuine in-house movement that added the full weight of credibility to the fluid time display.
“I must admit that I still had some reservations until I finally saw the movement that was to support the concept,” says Laurent Picciotto. And that’s when all doubt was dispelled – completely new mechanics, a view from the back displaying two incredible pistons, and a front face revealing traditional watch workings.
Did that provide enough reassurance for knowledgeable watch lovers? Definitely. But the retailer looks a little further. “I also took the teams and their backgrounds into consideration. What I saw at HYT was people from the medical sector, researchers, committed guys who were keen to succeed,” continues Laurent Picciotto. “I’m confident about the way they see things. They have the right resources – and the right methods.”
As 2012 draws to a close, the first HYTs have of course found a home at Chronopassion – probably for a very short space of time, given that demand is already far outstripping supply. However, this is a brand that we’ll be seeing plenty more of. “HYT will find its cruising speed and make its mark in the long term. It’s also a brand that’s likely to become a source of inspiration for many other independent watchmakers,” concludes Laurent Picciotto.
Journalist : Olivier Müller
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