Mercury In Retrograde

While it might be an optical illusion for the planet, the retrograde complication is one of the most fun watchmaking mechanisms to see in action. Franck Muller offers two interpretations.

-  FARHAN SHAH

EVERYONE KNOWS FRANCK MULLER for its iconic tonneaushaped cases. However, this shape did not come about after a bolt of inspiration. Rather, the eponymous watchmaker designed it to order for a client's wife in the 1980s.

After seeing the timepiece, the wife asked Muller if he could design a watch for her, too. "He only knew how to make complications. He didn't know about that kind of design," Franck Muller's CEO Nicholas Rudaz shared in an interview with magazine I-M. So, the watchmaker considered the lady's femininity and shaped the watch as an homage to her curves.

That initially worrisome request birthed a Franck Muller signature, which continues to this day in its Cintrée Curvex collection. We explore the Double Retrograde Hour and Retrograde Hour Day & Night, the two newest variations in this range, here.

Cintrée Curvex Double Retrograde Hour