Without question, one of the most staggering complicated wristwatches ever made is the Gerald Genta Grande Sonnerie watch. It debuted in 1994, and was designed by Pierre-Michel Golay, a great Genevan master of high complications, who based its design upon an important grande sonnerie pocket watch from the 19th century.
Of course, it wasn’t just as simple as that; Golay had to miniaturize the already staggering complexity of a grande sonnerie in its basic form, to the point that it could be fit–and perform acoustically–in a wristwatch case. Particularly noteworthy, was the addition of a self-winding mechanism. This latter point is remarkable and even today, 14 years later, this timepiece remains one of only a tiny handful of automatic-winding grande sonneries watches made. Because grande sonnerie mechanisms consume so much power (particularly in the ‘large strike’ mode which automatically chimes the hours as well as the hours combined with quarters every single quarter hour), the self-winding mechanism is a definite boon to keeping the barrels stoked with power–the rotor moving in one direction winds the mainspring barrel for the movement, and the other direction winds the barrel for the striking functions.
Nearly entirely in-house created, the Gerald Genta Grande Sonnerie watch movement comprises well over 800 hand-finished pieces in the space of just slightly over 11mm in height! Not only can the owner choose between the grande or lesser strike mode (or ’silent’ if you don’t wish to have it chime), the use of four gongs means that the chimes are of the particularly intricate Westminster Carillon type–chiming the famous Big Ben melody! If this weren’t enough, the Gerald Genta Grande Sonnerie watch also has a tourbillon complication.
Despite its near $1 million price tag, there is no lack of patient connoisseurs with the desire to own this virtuoso Gerald Genta watch. With fewer than five pieces being made per year, (assembly of the movement alone takes nearly 3 months) patience will prove a valuable virtue.�