Breaking News The Vacheron Constantin Les Cabinotiers 'Berkley Grand Complication,' With 63 Complications, Is The New Most Complicated Watch In The World

This is, by far, the longest story we'll publish for Watches & Wonders and yet fails to cover much of the watch's complexity. When Vacheron announced their last record-setting watch, the 57260 with its 57 complications, it elicited not one, not two, but three stories from three Hodinkee editors. Instead of adding complications to the previous watch, Vacheron has done something even more incredible by eschewing the Judaic calendar of the 57260 and inventing the first Chinese Perpetual Calendar. I'll tell you now: this story won't be exhaustive, but it won't be the last we do on this watch. Instead, I'll touch on the main highlights that I've gleaned. More about my personal take will be coming in the next few weeks, but I can say for certainty that the Berkley Grand Complication is so far beyond anything I've experienced that it's almost hard to comprehend.

Before we delve into the watch itself, let's discuss the name. Unlike the 57260, this watch was named by Vacheron. And, in doing so, Vacheron has unmasked the customer behind this watch, something unusual for a unique commission of this scale. The name – "Berkley Grand Complication" – references W. R. Berkley, the billionaire owner of the W. R. Berkley Corporation insurance holding company and Chairman of the Board of Trustees for New York University, who commissioned the watch. As of today, I can share that Mr. Berkley also owns the Vacheron 57260, making him the owner of the world's first and second-most complicated watches. He also owns the famed “King Farouk” pocket watch thatwas Vacheron's crowning achievement for seven decades from 1935 to 2005. This watch is viewed as the “sister” to the 57260, with the same case dimensions, material, and general design. But the name was almost certainly chosen to secure Berkley’s place in horological history, much like the Henry Graves Supercomplication, but beyond that, there's no information about why he finally decided to share his role in these watches. Mr. Berkley wasn't available for interviews, but I hope he'll reach out if he's reading this.

The Berkley Grand Complication results from 11 years of research and development from Vacheron and three of its master watchmakers in the Les Cabinotiers, meaning the brand started work before completing the 57260. The 57260 resulted in over 10 patent applications, but, not wanting to tip their hands, Vacheron hasn't applied for any patents for this watch yet. 

That doesn't mean there's any lack of innovation here. As was said about the 57260, the new Berkley Grand Comp is essentially a museum piece, both in form and function. Its size makes it unwieldy for any functional "pocket" watch (the kind of deep pockets required to commission this piece aren't the same as you'd need to wear it) – the watch measures 90.8mm in diameter by 50.55mm thick. Instead, the watch is presented in a presentation box. While I was not allowed to touch the watch, I was in the room as the brand shared the watch with a select few press and even members of the Vacheron Constantin executive team who had never seen the watch before.

I have to say the unveiling was strangely emotional for me. I have no part in this moment except being at the event, but as someone who grew up around (relatively simple) pocket watches, I couldn’t help but think of my grandfather who got me into the hobby. I wish he was alive so I could explain the watch to him, to discuss the achievements that watchmaking as a whole has accomplished, and how it lead to this moment. Sure, the watch is massive, expensive, and likely will disappear into a collection forever. But it was captivating in the moment and hard to forget. 

Like most supercomplications or megacomplications (of which there are really only a few), the watch has two dial sides. There are nine main complications categories, which I've shared with a full list of complications at the end of this story. The time-telling functions include regulator-type hours at a 12 o'clock counter on the front, while the minutes and unique retrograde seconds for mean solar time minutes hand and the seconds hand (on a 6 o'clock counter). The retrograde mechanism uses a system of two cams to compensate for the time it takes for the "seconds" hand to return to the "0" position. The watch is regulated by a visible spherical armillary tourbillon regulator with a spherical balance spring.

Of course, there is a Gregorian perpetual calendar – the one that most of us use on a daily basis. For the astronomical calendar and astronomical display, everything – including the sky chart and sunrise and sunset times – is calibrated to Shanghai, China. Though it probably would be unwieldy for most timing uses, there's also a three column-wheel, one-fifth-second, split-second chronograph.

Unsurprisingly, the chiming functions are also incredible. An alarm can be wound and set using a hidden crown revealed when the top bow is turned ¼ rotations. The watch can act as an alarm with a single gong and hammer, or a carillon-striking alarm. The repeater function has a carillon Westminster chiming function with five gongs and five hammers, a grande et petite sonnerie, a minute repeater, and the ability to silence the watch at night (from 22:00 to 8:00, as chosen by Mr. Berkeley).

The watch took 12 months to assemble, including a first assembly to test the movement before it was deconstructed for finishing and final reconstruction. Many of these complications are similar to the 57260, though the location-specific complications are notably different. When I first heard that the watch featured so many Chinese-specific complications, I assumed it would be going to a client of a market that has been strong for Vacheron Constantin and many other brands over the last few years. Last fall's Les Cabinotiers pieces seemed targeted for an Asian market. In reality, it doesn't seem to be a personal connection for Mr. Berkley but rather a practical one for the biggest achievement of the new Grand Complication.

To understand Vacheron's achievement, we have first to consider some history and immerse ourselves in a time-telling structure with which I'm sure many readers (like myself) aren't intimately familiar: the Chinese calendar. I attempted to learn a bit about this calendar when I wrote up the Parmigiani Fleurier Tonda PF Xiali Calendar, but most of what I learned was cursory and quickly forgotten. But unlike the Tonda PF, which approximates the Chinese calendar, this is the real deal, so it's important to know what Vacheron had to contend with.

The history of timekeeping is inextricably timed stars. Nearly every major culture has found its own way to adapt the inspiration of the celestial bodies to its timekeeping needs, many of which still persist in our calendars today. In a watch of this scale and complexity, telling the time of day is relatively inconsequential (though the watch has an accuracy of ±2 seconds/day while the chronograph runs). In fact, you could say the watch tells more about our place in the grander concepts of time, history, and our connections to that history that have shaped how we see the past, present and future.

William Berkley seems no stranger to these questions; in 2006, he donated money to Georgetown to start the Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs, dedicated to the interdisciplinary study of religion, ethics, and public life. So, in addition to the Gregorian Perpetual Calendar and ISO 8601 Perpetual Calendar, indications of sun, sidereal time, sky chart, and more, the ref. 57260 tackled the Perpetual Hebraic Calendar for the first time in a watch.

This time, Mr. Berkley requested Vacheron to develop another, more challenging complication. In doing so, they tackled another "lunisolar" calendar that I've long assumed might be impossible to execute in a watch, the Chinese Perpetual Calendar. Like the Hebraic calendar and many other Asian (and past ancient calendars), the Chinese calendar is similar to the Metonic cycle, where Meton of Athens realized that the discrepancies between the length of a lunar cycle and a solar cycle, the two only synchronize once every 19 years.

The Chinese lunar calendar months begin on the day of the new moon calculated on the 120th meridian east, passing through the Shandong peninsula and the city of Hangzhou. While the average lunar cycle is 29.53 days, the Chinese calendar uses 29 or 30 days per month, resulting in a calendar 11 days shorter than a solar year. To adjust for this, the Chinese calendar incorporates a 13th intercalary or embolismic month every two to three years, a total of seven times over that 19-year Metonic cycle. Depending on the month's inclusion, the Chinese year can have 353, 354, or 355 days, and the embolismic year 383, 384, or 385 days. You can start to see how difficult it would be to create a mechanical calendar to account for all these adjustments. But that's not all.

Then there's the Chinese solar year, a true tropical year, calculated at the same point on the map and measured between the two solstices. The calendar is divided into 24 periods of 15° each on the Sun's path as observed on Earth. Each period, known alternately as Jie (node) and Qi (vital breath), lasts approximately 15 days, giving an average duration that often is close to the Gregorian calendar.

Then comes the Zodiac, which is far more familiar to Western audiences. The Chinese calendar has units of time numbered based on the association of two series of signs – 10 celestial stems and 12 earthly branches – yielding a possible total of 60 combinations. The stems come from the five elements – wood, fire, earth, metal, water – which can have a feminine or masculine polarity, yin and yang. The branches correspond to 12 zodiac signs: rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, goat, monkey, rooster, dog, and pig.

While the Chinese have refined their calendar for millennia, the level of irregularity has made a mechanical representation of this calendar in a watch (one that wouldn't need frequent adjustment) seemingly impossible.

To accomplish this feat, Vacheron's watchmakers started with several algorithms to decide how to program the calendar to be accurate until 2200, following all the aforementioned irregularities. The result was three mechanical "brains" to control the cams and gears on one of the movement's two additional mechanisms on the front side. From a broad view, each is responsible for one of the calendar's components: the lunar cycle, the solar cycle, and the Metonic cycle (displayed at a counter at 3 o'clock).

To find your place on the Chinese calendar, you would start with the aperture at 11 o'clock, which tells whether this is a "normal" year or "embolismic" (with an extra added month), then determine whether the month is a short or long lunar month (aperture at 12 o'clock on the fixed New Year disc, which itself is at 6 o'clock on the dial). Indications in Chinese characters include a pointer-type date display on a 6 o'clock counter and aperture-type indications of the day at 8 o'clock and the month at 4 o'clock.

Vacheron Constantin has placed a jumping display of the 10 celestial stems, with their yin-yang polarity and associated elements for the day at 9 o'clock on the dial. At 3 o'clock, a counter shows the 12 earthly branches associated with the double hours (each day is subdivided into 12 two-hour segments, starting at 11 o'clock). Just below the hour and moonphase display (accurate to 1,027 years) at 12 o'clock, an aperture shows a silhouette of the Zodiac animal, which can be referenced against the celestial stem to find the place in the 60-year cycle. Last but not least, the watchmakers designed a disc display of the exact date of the Chinese New Year (which moves from January 20 to February 21).

While all these Chinese perpetual calendar displays are on what the team calls the "front" of the watch, the watchmakers included a Chinese agricultural calendar agricultural year's 24 solar periods, along with the month lengths, seasons, solstices, and equinoxes, all on the "caseback" side display.

It's a Herculean effort, and I'm hoping I'll get more images and diagrams of the movement. Vacheron has promised that the movement is immaculately finished (though we'll never see the movement behind the double dial, sadly), and I'm sure that's the case. Regardless, it was a pleasure to see the watch in person before it disappeared into Mr. Berkley's collection to likely never be seen again. I'll also have more thoughts and hands-on impressions in a video we filmed at the unveiling of the Berkley Grand Complication. For now, I'll leave you to look at the photos and see if you can attempt to peruse each of the different complications.

There's likely some part of you that's curious about each of the 63 functions that have totaled a record-breaking level of complication. I'll list the functions below, broken down by type, to simplify things.

Time measurement (9 Total): 1. Regulator-type hours, minutes, and seconds for mean solar time 2. Retrograde second for mean solar time 3. Day and night indication for reference city 4. Visible spherical armillary tourbillon regulator with spherical balance spring 5. Armillary sphere tourbillon 6. World time indication for 24 cities 7. Second time zone hours and minutes (on 12 hours display) 8. Second time zone day and night indication 9. System to display the second time zone for the Northern or Southern
hemispheres

Gregorian Perpetual Calendar (7 Total): 10. Gregorian perpetual calendar 11. Gregorian days of the week 12. Gregorian months 13. Gregorian retrograde date 14. Leap-year indication and four-year cycle 15. Number of the day of the week (ISO 8601 calendar) 16. Indication for the number of the week within the year (ISO 8601 calendar)

Chinese Perpetual Calendar (11 Total): 17. Chinese perpetual calendar 18. Chinese number of the day. 19. Chinese name of the month 20. Chinese date indication 21. Chinese zodiac signs 22. 5 elements and 10 celestial stems 23. 6 energies and 12 earthly branches 24. Chinese year state (common or embolismic) 25. Month state (small or large) 26. Indication for the Golden number within the 19-year Metonic cycle 27. Indication for the date of the Chinese New Year in the Gregorian calendar

Chinese Agricultural Perpetual Calendar (2 Total): 28. Chinese agricultural perpetual calendar. 29. Indications of seasons, equinoxes, and solstices with solar hand.

Astronomic Calendar (9 Total): 30. Sky chart (calibrated for Shanghai) 31. Sidereal hours 32. Sidereal minutes 33. Sunrise time (calibrated for Shanghai) 34. Sunset time (calibrated for Shanghai) 35. Equation of time 36. Length of the day (calibrated for Shanghai) 37. Length of the night (calibrated for Shanghai) 38. Phases and age of the moon, one correction every 1027 years.

Split-seconds Chronograph (4 Total): 39. Fifths of a second chronograph (1 column wheel) 40. Fifths of a second split-second chronograph (1 column wheel) 41. 12-hour counter (1 column wheel) 42. 60-minute counter

Alarm (7 Total): 43. Progressive alarm with single gong and hammer striking 44. Alarm strike/silence indicator 45. Choice of normal alarm or carillon striking alarm indicator 46. Alarm mechanism coupled to the carillon striking mechanism 47. Alarm striking with choice of grande or petite sonnerie 48. Alarm power-reserve indication 49. System to disengage the alarm barrel when fully wound

Westminster Carillon (8 Total): 50. Carillon Westminster chiming with 5 gongs and 5 hammers 51. Grande sonnerie passing strike 52. Petite sonnerie passing strike 53. Minute repeating 54. Night silence feature (between 22.00 and 08.00 hours – hours chosen by the owner) 55. System to disengage the striking barrel when fully wound 56. Indication for grande or petite sonnerie modes 57. Indication for silence / striking / night modes

Additional features (6) 58. Power-reserve indication for the going train 59. Power-reserve indication for the striking train 60. Winding crown position indicator 61. Winding system for the double barrels 62. Hand-setting system with two positions and two directions 63. Concealed flush-fit winding crown for the alarm mechanism.

Vacheron Constantin Les Cabinotiers Berkley Grand Complication, 9901C/000G-B472, 90.8mm diameter by 50.55mm thick 18k white gold dual-sided pocket watch case. Silver opaline dials, with 31 hands, and 9 discs for 63 functions, listed above. Caliber 3752 manual-winding movement measuring 72mm by 36mm thick running at 18,000 vph and ±2 seconds/day while the chronograph runs, with 245 jewels, 2,877 components, and 60 hours of power reserve. Total weight of 960 grams. Bespoke piece, no price given.