Simply Abu Dhabi XXIX

2 1 0 S I M P LY A B U DH A B I T he newest timepiece fromBovet is something of a mouthful when it comes to the title—it’s the 10-Day Triple Time Zone Flying Tourbillon with Hemispherical Earth Maps and Reversed Hand- Fitting, 3 Times Patented. If it needs a long name that’s because it’s incredibly, almost inconceivably complex, and a true work of art. To provide some historical background of the Maison before we admire the timepiece, Bovet officially began on 1 May 1822, but its destiny was set in motion by a major event, four years earlier in 1818—two centuries ago. Three watchmakers—Frédéric, Alphonse and Edouard Bovet—left their home village of Fleurier in 1814, bound for London, to develop their sales skills. There, Edouard Bovet displayed remarkable talent combined with a visionary mind. This far-sightedness led him to board the Orwell, a ship belonging to the East India Company, on April 20, 1818 for a four-month odyssey that took him all the way to Guangzhou. He arrived in the Chinese city as a trailblazer on August 16 the same year, carrying four timepieces whose technical and aesthetic qualities were hitherto unseen. A Chinese collector bought the four pieces for 10,000 Swiss francs each, the equivalent of 1,000,000 Swiss francs today. The enthusiasm for the Bovet brothers’ watchmaking quickly reached the Emperor, and before long their work had captivated the nation. The impact was such that Bovet (pronounced Bo-Wei) became synonymous with high-end watches in the everyday Chinese language. To mark the bicentenary of this key event in the brand’s rich history, Pascal Raffy and the craftsmen in his manufactures have chosen to design and make a timepiece dedicated to travel. Raffy is himself a collector of fine watches both old and new, and therefore has a solid understanding of the expectations of fellow collectors. It is as a collector and the owner of Bovet that he has presided over the development and fine-tuning of all of the Maison’s timepieces ever since he acquired it in 2001. Edouard Bovet Tourbillon