Hands-on: Cecil Purnell Double Spherion Escape II watch

I haven’t had time to play with Cecil Purnell watches for a while. This brand was founded by Jon Purnell as an interesting vanity project because his money comes from other companies-the name is to commemorate his ancestors of watchmakers. The Cecil Purnell brand has been committed to producing a small number of wild-looking and mechanically powerful watches for decisive and wealthy customers. This has always allowed the brand to invest in small batches to produce highly original watches because the retail price of each watch is very high.

The latest eye-catching watch is the simply named Escape II, which features the “Double Spherion” system designed by Eric Coudray. This is the person who developed some watches for Cabestan and the gyroscope for Jaeger-LeCoultre. I believe he cannot use this term because it is owned by Jaeger-LeCoultre, so he developed a new term called “Spherion” to describe the evolution of this concept. The Escape II watch includes a movement with two Spherions, which can be operated in opposite directions due to the way they are connected. They are also connected to a differential that enables the watch to display the time adjusted by the average of the timing of the two systems. Wearing the system can also allow people to publicly ask an otherwise inappropriate question, “Do you want to see my double flying ball?”

Each spherical three-axis tourbillon system is also quite fast at 30 seconds (instead of 60 seconds). This is not only a transmission technique, but also requires Coudray to rethink the construction of the “traditional” spherical tourbillon frame, because it is faster and requires greater acceleration torque. This means that the movement uses a lot of power and therefore requires some hard core springs. The Calibre CP03 manual movement actually has six springs between the four barrels (two of which are stuck in two barrels), and still only has a 32-hour power reserve! I have never worn such a power-hungry watch before. Therefore, the case is on the thicker side. The CP03 movement alone is 13.3 mm thicker than the Rolex Submariner.

The CP03 movement is made of 386 parts and the operating frequency is 3Hz. The dial shows the hours and minutes, as well as a power reserve indicator (you need) and a dual spherical display. There is no doubt that the entire intellectual exercise of the Double Spherion Escape II watch involves making something that looks cool. There is no serious intention to improve the watch or innovate the industry. This happens when you need to convince die-hard collectors that there is something wild and fresh (if they can afford it, they suddenly can’t live without it). buy watches online

Therefore, Eric Coudray and Cecil Purnell succeeded. Escape II will not be everyone’s cup of tea, but it is a truly awesome creation without precise equality. Coudray-a fan of heavy metal and heavy facial hearing-is good at making jumping springs and wheels that impress viewers. Then, Purnell only needs to set up a stage around Coudray’s metal performance for watch fans watching it.

For this reason, I believe that Coudray is particularly satisfied with the sapphire crystals that extend to the sides of the case to better observe the movement. This form of watch case itself is made of grade 5 titanium with black DLC coating. It is actually very comfortable with a custom rubber strap-although it is not completely practical, and when you do something impractical, such as spraying in your own lake on your 40-foot bullet boat , It will become the best. Again, the 48mm wide and 19mm thick case is only water resistant to 30 meters (which is great for splashing water-just don’t decide to soak).

In many ways, I admire the Cecil Purnell Double Spherion Escape II watch almost entirely dedicated to modern design. Although it was built and designed by traditional watchmakers, there is hardly anything that can be traced back to the watchmaking tradition. It may not reach the straightforward elegance of Ferrari, but it will put a smile on your face, just like someone manages to install a $350,000 upgrade into a pickup truck.