Erotica is maybe not one of the first things one thinks about when considering Swiss made watches. However it is certainly not out of place, because luxury, opulence and erotica have always been, no pun intended, close bedfellows.
The ‘idle rich’ as they used to be known, had plenty of time on their hands to consider the pursuit of the erotic. It was clear from the start that Abraham Louis Perrelet, was destined to be a watchmaker. He was born on the 9 January 1729 in Le Locle, With exceptional gifts and his passion combined his name is among the greats in the history of watchmaking. He was born into an era when the landed gentry both in Europe and in Great Britain were openly seeking both luxury and erotica.
Abraham Louis Perrelet
Whether or not Perrelet himself ever created ‘conversation piece’ watches is unknown but blessed with an inventive mind, he innovated and perfected a range of new complications to improve the way timepieces ran. He became the first person in Le Locle to produce cylinder escapements, duplex escapements, perpetual calendar escapements and equation of time escapements. He also developed the first self-winding automatic watch in 1777.
It was around the same era that erotic watches displaying lustful images first emerged. Every generation likes to think it invented sex, but erotic watches, known as ‘conversation pieces’ so called because of the earnest debate they aroused, would have been around in your great, great grandmother’s time. Then as now, wealthy young men loved to show off their expensive new timepieces and impress peers with their risqué ‘conversation pieces’. There were collectors of such watches then, and there are definitely collectors of such watches now.
Perrelet Turbine Erotic (Rotor)
And so it is that a couple of years ago Perrelet introduced a watch from their popular Turbine collection that is perfectly suited to a little peekaboo erotica. Perrelet chose Japanese manga or hentai illustrations as their form of erotica, which can be viewed through the whirring of the double rotor turbine blades. Hentai is a comic book style of erotic drawing which has a huge following in Japan and increasingly so in the West. The art form has been successfully converted into animated movies where little, or frankly nothing, is left to the imagination.
The possibilities afforded by Perrelet’s double-rotor watches makes this new theme worthy of the brand’s ancestral craft skills while at the same time remaining discreetly invisible for anyone who does not know the correct way in which to display them.
Perrelet Turbine Erotic
The saucy illustrations are rendered in black and white with touches of comic book style red. The watches act a little like an old fashioned ‘What the butler saw’ machine when, following a flick of the wrist, the 12 blades of the turbine rotor reveal the pictures on the dial. As the rotor spins the illustrations the wearer sees what is normally obscured. The whirring blades produce a flickering image as if viewing an old and forbidden XXX movie.
The watch series is powered by Perrelet’s in-house automatic P-181 movement, with the unique double rotor winding system. The four watches in the series, each limited to just 88 pieces, come in a 44-mm case of either titanium or black-DLC-coated stainless steel.
Perrelet Turbine Erotic (Limited Edition Watch)
They come on quality rubber straps with folding clasps of DLC-coated steel. Each of the four variations is limited to just 88 pieces, and priced at $6,150. To attract customers Perrelet have thoughtfully taken pictures of the watches without the obscuring blades. Their introduction a couple of years ago certainly caused a stir.
Perrelet Turbine Erotic – Technical Specifications
Dial: 4 variations, erotic manga designs behind the black Turbine, white or red numerals, white hour-markers.
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- Ref. A4020/1
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- Ref. A4020/2
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- Ref. A4020/3
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- Ref. A4020/4
Movement:
- Mehanical self-winding P-181
- Double Rotor / Exclusive to Perrelet
Case:
- Black DLC-coated steel or titanium
- Diameter 44 mm, thickness 12.50 mm
- Anti-glare sapphire (front & back)
Water Resistance: 5 ATM,
Functions: Central hands indicating hour minute and seconds,
Strap: Black rubber strap, steel folding clasp in DLC-coated steel,
Limited Edition: 88 per model.
More resources about the Perrelet Turbine Erotic on the Official Perrelet Website.
