Piaget, established in 1874, is going to its the 145th anniversary. The word “ultra-thin” plays an important role in the whole history of watchmaking. Stand here and look back to the past, we find that the word “ultra-thin” has been a synonym of Piaget. Piaget sets another new record over and over and motivates itself to achieve self-transcendence. It carries out its brand motto with practical action–Always do better than necessary.
Back to 1957, the first ultra-thin movement Calibre 9P by Piaget was researched successfully and launched. The new road to ultra-slim movements was opened up. Piaget calibre 9P, 2mm thick, set the record for the world’s the thinnest movement. In that era with technological underdevelopment, it is superior to current ultra-thin movements. The record hit the watchmaking field then, but it was just a beginning. Three years later, another ultra-thin mechanical movement at 2.3mm thick, calibre 12P, came out. Although calibre 12P is 0.3mm thicker than calibre 9P, the feature for self winding represents the progress. There is no doubt that Piaget cal.12P became the world’s thinnest automatic mechanical movement in that time. Cal.9P and Cal.12P laid the important foundations for the future development of Piaget’s ultra-thin movements.
After that, Piaget didn’t developed ultra-thin movements until 1998. Why? The entire Swiss watchmakers were withstanding the “Quartz Crisis” from the late 1960s to the late 1980s. During the period, quartz watches by Japan dominated the main-stream market, while Switzerland didn’t take place of Japan in the watchmaking market until 1994. Back to the theme, Piaget Cal.430P with hand winding on basis of Cal.9P made a hit again, and it’s 21.mm thick. It provided the design blueprint for the world’s thinnest rectangle movement, Cal.600P. In 2002, Piaget Cal.600P came out, which was fitted with a tourbillon, one of three grand complicated functions. 3.5mm-thick Piaget Cal.600P was honored as the world’s thinnest tourbillon movement. The tourbillon in titanium was set at 12 O’clock, weighting 0.2 gram.
On basis of Cal.600P, Piaget Cal.608P relative tourbillon was unveiled at SIHH 2006. It was equipped in Piaget Polo tourbillon watches. To people’s surprise, the tourbillon was set at the end of the minute hand. It rotates once every minute, meanwhile, it will spin once every hour along with the minute hand. To celebrate the 50th anniversary of calibre 12P, Piaget Cal.1208P came out in 2010, which was the first automatic movement with a Micro rotor in rose gold, at 2.35mm thick. One year later, Piaget gave the watchmaking field a big surprise, Piaget Cal.1270P. It’s the first ultra-thin self-winding tourbillon movement, at 5.55mm thick. It’s a masterpiece.
In 2013, Piaget launched the first Minute Repeater watch, Piaget Emperador Minute Repeater equipped with calibre 1290P. 4.8mm thick Cal.1290P set the newest record in the filed of Minute Repeater movements. Once pressing the device at 9 O’clock, the Minute Repeater works. To 2013, Piaget has been a “grand slam” champion in the field of grand complicated functions. Piaget has started its new stage since 2014.
