The New Black Dials of the C by Romain Gauthier Titanium Edition Bracelet

In 2021, esteemed independent watchmaker Romain Gauthier unveiled his first luxury sports watch, the Continuum, aka the ‘C’, and a year later designed an integrated titanium bracelet for this watch. Since its debut, the C has appeared with cases in titanium and luxury editions in platinum, fitted with rubber straps or integrated metal bracelets, flaunting closed dials and semi-openworked versions.  A radical departure from Gauthier’s off-centred timepieces like the Insight and Logical One, the Continuum is a more contemporary, sporty model with plenty of intriguing details that bear the hand of its maker. Joining the successful collection are two new candidates in titanium with black dials, one with a semi-openworked dial.

The twisting bezel of the C by Romain Gauthier, with six indentations scalloped into the bevelled edge of the bezel, is as unusual as it is original. To highlight this original design, the facets hewn into the bezel are polished to reflect the light, while the rest of the bezel is satin-finished. Another idiosyncratic detail is the position of the crown at 2 o’clock. Crafted from grade 5 titanium, the 50m water-resistant watch has a diameter of 41mm, a height of 9.95mm, a lug-to-lug of 49.5mm and a weight of just 85g.

The fluid, sensual design of the case flows to embrace the integrated bracelet. For stylistic continuity, the beautifully constructed and articulated bracelet is decorated like the case with satin-finished surfaces and brightly hand-polished connecting links that echo the facets in the bezel.

The semi-openworked dial has a series of black horizontal PVD grooves decorating the closed area of the dial, imparting a slightly grained and raised texture. The Arabic numerals at 12, 3, 6 and 9 o’clock are crafted from blocks of Super-LumiNova as are the applied indices that vary in length. Off-centred layouts are a speciality at RG, and some of the dial elements are also subtly off-centred. The central hour and minute hands, for example, are not centred and placed slightly above the horizontal axis of the dial.

The openworked area reveals the small seconds counter at 7 o’clock, which features ten light blue lines and two longer lines of different lengths traversing the centre. The seconds wheel (a symbol of the brand) can be seen in this openworked area, as can the escapement line assembly with the escapement wheel, balance and pallet. Surrounded by a scalloped titanium bridge, its grainy boucharder texture is also featured on the movement’s bridges. The hour and minute hands and the small seconds hand are filed with SLN. The closed titanium dial with a black PVD coating features the same numerals and indices, but the area encompassing the small seconds is closed. There is no trace of colour here, and the track for the small seconds and minutes is white.

The manual-winding movement of the C by Romain Gauthier reveals its architecture with horizontal, stepped finger bridges. While an entire page could be dedicated to describing the contemporary finishings alone, the technical virtues of the movement include the 60-hour power reserve and the stop-seconds function. Unlike most hacking seconds, RG uses a snail cam. When the crown is extracted, the cam stops the balance wheel, but when the crown is pushed in, the snail cam turns and gives the balance an impulse to start beating again.

The new C by Romain Gauthier titanium with black dials are non-limited editions. The ref. MON00582 with a closed black dial retails for CHF 42,000 (excl. tax), while the semi-openworked MON00584 version retails for CHF 52,000 (excl. tax). More information at RomainGauthier.com.