The Alpine Eagle collection of sporty-chic timepieces welcomes a new model for the gentlemen honouring the longstanding partnership between Chopard and Seddiqi, while the watchmaking maison celebrates its love of life through an exceptional watch for the ladies issued in eight-piece limited editions and honouring the panda in an absolutely stunning Happy Sport Métiers d’Art
Alpine Eagle 41 Darshan (Seddiqi Edition)
Issued in a 25-piece limited edition, this exclusive 41 mm-diameter model is adorned with a dial whose hue and texture evoke the slate stone characteristic of the Alpine biotope. Crafted in Chopard’s exclusive ultra-sturdy, exceptionally bright Lucent Steel alloy, it beats to the rhythm of the Chopard 01.15-C movement whose chronometer certification testifies to its high-precision adjustment. The Alpine Eagle 41 Darshan model is named after the eagle that in 2015 achieved the highest bird flight ever recorded from a man-made structure.
Darshan, a term evoking direct visual contact with a spiritual master, was the name chosen by Jacques-Olivier Travers for one of the eagles in his wildlife park. In 2015, Darshan honoured both his name and his breeder when – spreading his wings to swoop down from the top of the Burj Khalifa in Dubai – he broke the record for the highest bird flight from a man-made structure. A few years later, Jacques-Olivier Travers and Chopard’s Co-President Karl-Friedrich Scheufele jointly founded the Alpine Eagle Foundation, which now runs innovative, multi-disciplinary environmental projects designed to raise public awareness of the importance, beauty and fragility of the Alpine biotope.
With the Alpine Eagle 41 Darshan model, the collection welcomes a new dial variation featuring finishing and colour details recreating the slate stone emblematic of Alpine landscapes. On this elegant display, the hours, minutes and seconds are indicated by gilded hour-markers and hands enhanced with Super-LumiNova Grade X1, offering a legible contrast that is optimal by both day and night, as befits a sporty-chic timepiece.
The Chopard 01.15-C self-winding movement beating at the heart of this model – and visible through a transparent sapphire crystal case-back – is developed in its own watchmaking workshops and certified by the Official Swiss Chronometer Testing Institute, with the word “Chronometer” embossed on the dial. When fully wound, the mechanism provides 60 hours of power reserve. The watchmakers have also equipped this movement with a stop-seconds function enabling the wearer to set the time to the exact second.
Happy Sport Métiers d’Art
Equipped with Chopard Calibre 96.23-L with its 65-hour power reserve, crafted from ethical 18-carat rose gold, magnificently hand-decorated and entirely set with sparkling gems, the Happy Sport Métiers d’Art is the quintessence of all existing codes of excellence in both watchmaking and jewellery. This model issued in an eight-piece limited series raises the art of watchmaking and jewellery to a new pinnacle.
The panda is an endangered species whose beauty and ecosystem are majestically celebrated on this timepiece. Precious stones and mother-of-pearl marquetry cast a spell in multi-dimensional layers on the watch dial and movement, shaping a landscape of dazzling and mesmerising depth. Framed by a bezel paved with chaton-set diamonds, the dial seems to melt into the light of the precious stones, which in turn spills over onto the likewise full-set 40 mm case.
The dial of this Happy Sport invites us to immerse ourselves in the bamboo forest and the treasures of floral biodiversity that are essential to the giant panda’s survival. Against a mother-of-pearl background, the panda appears perched among bamboo stalks adorned with flamboyant cherry blossoms – symbolising ephemeral beauty and perpetual evolution – featuring a pistil composed of diamonds. A black-lacquered, onyx and diamond panda moves serenely across this ecosystem, surrounded by three heart-shaped dancing diamonds. The bridges and the micro-rotor of Chopard Calibre 96.23-L visible through the case-back pick up the colours, mother-of-pearl textures and geometrical shapes of the dial.
Chopard presents a major innovation in this new Happy Sport Métiers d’Art timepiece that completely reinvents the Happy Diamonds choreography and endows their movement with unprecedented quality. A perfectly viscous liquid has been developed to accommodate a new tempo for the diamonds moving between the two crystals, enabling them to whirl with the elastic flexibility of weightless motion. The development of this process notably focused on compensating for the variations in temperature and pressure generated by integrating this new liquid between the two sapphire crystals: a feat that testifies to Chopard’s technical innovation.
At the heart of this case, magnificently decorated by in-house jewellers, beats a mechanical self-winding movement, Chopard 96.23-L. Resulting from the development of the first calibre (L.U.C 96.01-L) presented by Chopard Manufacture in 1996, it is equipped with two series-coupled barrels enabling the watch to accumulate a generous 65-hour power reserve thanks to Chopard Twin technology. It is also fitted with a platinum micro-rotor ensuring perfect winding of the barrels while saving space in the case. Adorned with mother-of-pearl, like the accompanying dial, the movement is revealed through the exhibition back of the ethical 18-carat rose gold case, thus revealing the exquisite allure and the quintessence of the watchmaking expertise exercised by Chopard’s artisans.
