IWC Combine Complications in the Portugieser Tourbillon Retrograde Chronograph

In the wake of the insane, record-breaking Eternal and their recent forays into the haute horology for the F1 movie, IWC’s complication flexing continues unabated with the new, non-Lewis Hamilton-designed version of the IWC Portugieser Tourbillon Retrograde Chronograph.

IWC aren’t best known for their tourbillons. Militaristic pilot’s watches, a cool Genta icon, lashings of ceramic, check, check and check. But tourbillons? And yet the Schaffhausen-based watchmaker has a solid scattering across their range, including the Big Pilot with their recent Le Petit Prince editions. More often than not however those tourbillons can be found in the dressier Portugieser collection. The difference here is that the 60-second, 6 o’clock tourbillon has been paired with a less haute horological but more unusual retrograde date.

The date at 9 o’clock runs from the 1^st to the 31^st before snapping back to the 1^st. We’ve seen plenty of them on Richemont stablemate Vacheron (they’re a bit of a master there) but not at IWC – which is a shame because it suits the large dial of the Portugieser to a tee. I consistently love retrogrades and elements like this are why.

Finally, because this is IWC, there’s also a flyback chronograph, and IWC have done a really good job here at keeping the display clean and clear. Running minutes and the chronograph seconds are central as per usual. The seconds are technically on the tourbillon cage and both chronograph minutes and hours have been put onto the same 12 o’clock subdial. It’s neat, succinct and given most chronographs focus on seconds over hours, makes a lot of sense.

All of that is powered by the 89900 calibre automatic movement which, despite so many energy-intensive complications, has a 68-hour power reserve. That’s not entirely down to the mainspring either. The escape wheel and pallet lever – the main parts of the escapement – are made from silicon and coated with what IWC call their Diamond Shell technology. It’s essentially an extra coating that lowers friction past even what silicon can deliver, making one of the key points of horological inefficiency that much smoother.

This is all a lot of watchmaking. So, with proprietary golds being more of a thing than ever – even Breguet are getting in on the action – it’s no surprise to see IWC wheeling out their Armor gold for this bad boy. Rather than a slightly shifted colour though, this joins the likes of Hublot’s Magic Gold as a much harder precious metal alloy. It’s still 75% pure gold, but the last 25% of its make-up is an alchemical secret. In short, it looks like rose gold but you don’t need bubble wrap to keep it safe.

You get a lot of that gold, too. The Portugieser collection is always large – it’s genesis was as an oversized customer order – but the 43.5mm diameter and chunky 15.9mm thickness pair to make this a weighty watch on the wrist.

That gold is paired with a black dial that, rather than the usual anodising is instead lacquered. The 15 layers of semi-transparency add much more depth than most finishes. It turns a standard black colouring into a deep, rich background to the gold handset, numerals and that gently turning tourbillon cage.

The IWC Portugieser Tourbillon Retrograde Chronograph looks like a million dollars, though, it’s actually slightly more affordable than the 44-piece Hamilton version, which costs £143,000. Instead, this 100-piece limited edition will only set you back the uber-accessible price of £127,000. I mean, I have seen pricier tourbillons (just about). But would you have this over, say, a Mark XX?

More details at IWC.