During a press conference ahead of the Belgian Grand Prix last week, Lewis Hamilton pulled out all the Ferrari-themed stops—right down to his wristwear.
Look closely and you’ll spot an RM 43-01 Manual Winding Tourbillon Split-Seconds Chronograph Ferrari on his wrist, a $1.5M timepiece released this past March in both titanium/Carbon TPT and full-Carbon TPT editions. Ever since the introductory press conference for this watch, Hamilton has favored this black version with yellow accents. “Today’s current Ferrari drivers are not the type of people you can just tell what to wear, so if they want to wear the watch, they are able to but it will be up to them,” Alexandre Mille, the brand’s sales director and son of founder Richard Mille, said teasingly. Clearly it wasn’t a struggle to get Hamilton to give it a test drive.
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The 43-01 is the latest in a collection of collaborative pieces produced with the famed Italian sports car manufacturer. The first, a favorite of Pharrell, resembles an AmEx Platinum card and momentarily held the record for the thinnest watch in the world. Hamilton’s new wristwear is much more typical Richard Mille: tech-forward, colorful, complicated, eye-wateringly expensive, and wildly cool. Each of the new pieces is limited to just 75 pieces and features several cool Ferrari-inspired details. The most obvious are the Ferrari logo in the bottom-left corner of the case and the yellow borrowed from its logo. Others require a deep knowledge of the legendary automaker’s cars. The design of the grooved bezel is inspired by the hood of a Ferrari Daytona SP3 and the pushers are meant to look like the lights on the rear of an SF90 Stradale. No detail was overlooked. Richard Mille even used the same Hexagon Socket-Head Screws Ferrari uses to secure pieces of its engine cover.
Outside of all the Ferrari goodness, the watch is classic Richard Mille. The brand’s signature tonneau-shaped case measures 42.9 mm wide and a whopping 17.1 mm thick. RM packs a ton of gear inside. The brand’s hand-wound caliber—also called RM 43-01—beats at 3 Hz and features a wild bill of complications, from a split-seconds chronograph with dual column wheels and a 30-minute register to a tourbillon to a power reserve display to a torque display to a crown-function indicator. Produced from corrosion-resistant Grade 5 titanium and thoroughly skeletonized, the movement’s asymmetric design boasts titanium and Carbon TPT bridges, gold finishing on the split-second function brake, and hexagonal spline screws to match those found on Ferrari engine covers. You’ll hardly be surprised to learn that given its incredible sophistication, the RM 43-01 required three years of R&D.
As is the case with all manner of Richard Mille creations, the RM 43-01 is completely overengineered, utterly outrageous, and over-the-top fun. At $1.5M for Hamilton’s full-Carbon TPT version (and roughly $1.3M for the titanium and Carbon TPT version), it’s the perfect racing watch for the Ferrari driver.
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Courtesy of IWC
Sterling K. Brown’s IWC Ingenieur Automatic 40 (ref. IW328908)
Appearing on Jimmy Kimmel Live! this week, Sterling K. Brown pulled a Lewis Hamilton by matching his threads to his timepiece. Brown did so with a handsome, double-breasted forest green suit and an IWC Ingenieur Automatic 40 (ref. IW328908) with a green dial. The new Ingenieur is based on Gérald Genta’s redesign of the watch from the ‘70s. (In addition to this IWC, the legendary watch designer is also responsible for the Patek Philippe Nautilus and Audemars Piguet Royal Oak.) And like all things Genta nowadays, IWC’s relaunched Ingenieur has proven wildly popular in multiple colors, from black to blue to silver and green. Brown’s green-dial variation was inspired by a custom piece IWC and Cloister Watch Co. made for Brad Pitt to wear in the new F1 movie.
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Angel Reese’s Bulgari Serpenti
Ahead of a game in Minneapolis this week, Chicago Sky forward Angel Reese went head-to-toe Gucci with one notable exception. On her wrist? Bulgari’s Serpenti Tubogas watch. Ever since its debut in 1948, this serpentine creation has captured the imagination of watch and jewelry lovers the world over, and it’s not difficult to see why: With its hollow, tubogas bracelet and its uniquely shaped watch head, it manages to modulate the shape and character of a snake into a distinctly luxurious object. Reese’s steel version features a 35-mm watch head with a diamond-set bezel, a black dial in a guilloché soleil pattern, a cabochon-cut rubellite crown, and a quartz movement.
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Orlando Bloom’s Porsche Design Chronograph 1 1975 Limited Edition
Porsche Design brand ambassador Orlando Bloom announced the new Chronograph 1 1975 Limited Edition at an event in New York City this week. The new piece is a titanium take on a mid-’70s version of the company’s famed tool watch. While the Porsche Design Chronograph 1 was originally launched as an all-black watch that used an early version of PVD, a plain-steel iteration followed in 1975. So while you’d never know it looking at Bloom’s sleek and modern watch, it’s based on an archival design from 50 years ago. Limited to 350 pieces, the Chronograph 1 1975 is powered by the Porsche Design WERK 01.240, which is based upon the Valjoux 7750 used in the original. Boasting automatic winding and flyback capability, the Chronograph 1 is a highly capable tool watch and a handsome-looking object made all the better by lightweight titanium construction.
Courtesy of Porsche Design
Courtesy of Porsche Design
Marcus Rashford’s Patek Philippe ref. 5180/1R-001
English footballer Marcus Rashford wore the Patek Philippe ref. 5180/1R-001, a skeletonized time-only watch from the maison’s Rare Handcrafts collection. Measuring 39 mm in rose gold, this dressy piece features an entirely skeletonized version of the cal. 240, whose hand decoration requires some 130 hours of patient work. Paired to a matching rose gold multi-link bracelet with a fold-over clasp, it’s both a statement piece as well as a perfect dress watch. At just 6.7 mm thick, it’ll slip right under a cuff—which is exactly what it did when Rashford wore it with a tuxedo in Barcelona.
