It’s not often we get a new round watch from Richard Mille, but that’s exactly what the brand is delivering this month in a successor to the RM 33-02, with the aptly named RM 33-03. In true RM fashion, just because it’s round doesn’t mean it’s conventional. The RM 33-03 retains the hallmark aesthetic features you’d expect from the brand, which is the product of high-tech production methods, openworked bridges, and organic shapes somehow all coming together better than they have any right to. With the RM 33-03, there is an element of the familiar, however, even more so than the outgoing reference, and the result represents a striking balance between highly conceptual forms, and practical timekeeping.
Richard Mille watches are nothing if not evocative. Even in round form, the RM 33-03 manages to cut against the grain in its overall form. The case itself, which is crafted in either titanium or carbon TPT, takes the form of a hyperbolic paraboloid (or a Pringle chip, if you’d rather), and the integrated strap is a part of that, resulting in watch the forms to the wrist in a very unique manner. Regardless of material, the case measures 41.7mm in diameter, and 9.7mm in thickness, but those numbers don’t really apply in the normal sense given the unique nature of the case’s shape.
As interesting (if not beautiful by traditional standards) as the case is, the movement within offers plenty to nerd out on. RM is using a new skeletonised automatic RMXP3 caliber that measures 3.28mm in profile, thanks in part to an off-center platinum monobloc rotor mounted on ceramic ball bearings providing energy to the mainspring in both directions. The plates and bridges are made from titanium, and are treated with an electro-plasma oxidation process called Titalyt® meant to harden the often very slim pieces. F.P. Journe also uses this process, which has the added benefit of protecting the pieces from degradation over time.
The bridges are then given a black PVD coating for aesthetic purposes, allowing the dial components to stand out with an acceptable level of contrast for legibility. A dial structure is layered on top with organic shapes cut out allowing for a view to the internals of the movement. What’s most unusual here is, ironically, an element we might expect to find on other round watches, and that is a subsidiary seconds placed symmetrically at six o’clock. If that feels a little too conventional, don’t worry, situated directly next to this sub-dial is a vertically oriented date aperture using the brand’s futuristic typeface.
Watches that push the envelope and refuse to be boring in the process are worth celebrating. Richard Mille certainly falls within this category, and I think their polarizing nature is a healthy thing. The RM 33-03 breaks out of the brand’s signature tonneau structure without compromising what makes them special in the first place. It’s a bit weird, a bit innovative, and entirely rad. Pricing for the RM 33-03 begins at 115,000CHF for the titanium reference, and rises to 145,000CHF for the carbon TPT reference. Richard Mille
