With masks not compulsory in most places, our ability to read a person’s mood is more effortless. With that, we cannot help but smile at the RM 88 Automatic Tourbillon Smiley by Richard Mille. The universal yellow face icon made its debut in 1972 and is featured prominently on this watch — yes, even the crown has the emoji.
This timepiece was three years in the making and displayed a new in-house automatic tourbillon calibre. Technical and aesthetic challenges were met, such as the attention given to the dimensions and weight of the gold micro-sculptures created by the engraver Olivier Kuhn. He ensured that extra care was given to the assembled parts, each weighing less than a gram, and must withstand every type of shock.
Besides this, arranging the objects in a three-dimensional space around the Smiley motif was deemed necessary. Decorative elements include a blossoming flower, the sun's warm rays, a delicious pineapple, a blooming cactus, a pink flamingo, and a brightly-coloured rainbow.
The solution was to equip the RM 88 with two baseplates: One technical to support the movement, and the other auxiliary, to secure the ornamentation on the left-hand side of the dial. This second baseplate is mounted onto the movement and presents the objects on an inclined plane for an added volume effect.
Another challenge faced is the conception of a movement that allowed enough free space to display the objects to give them an impact. The new CRMT7 calibre was developed in-house, a skeletonised automatic tourbillon movement with hour, minute and function displays. Its bridges and micro-blasted baseplate are grade five titanium to ensure rigidity and flatness.
The bridge features an explosive micro-blasted, bevelled and drawn-out tourbillon with a complex double PVD coating in black and gold and a finish replicated on the bridge at the back of the baseplate. With every minute, the figurative small-second hand alternates between rain and the changing weather. It glides its way over the ARCAP cloud affixed to the tourbillon and then hides beneath a small cloud in micro-blasted and satin-finished white gold.
It re-emerges at the foot of a cheerful rainbow designed in four different types of gold. The rainbow has an alternated micro-blasted and drawn-out finish representing 25 hours of craftsmanship. The Smiley figure appears in micro-blasted and painted yellow gold and presides over this landscape from atop the additional motion-work bridge in micro-blasted ARCAP with polished anglage, a traditional finishing technique with a sharp edge that is softened and polished by hand.
The quest for perfection is ever-present, as demonstrated by the green PVD-coated leaves, the pineapple's micro-blasted and polished surface, the cactus's micro-blasted spines in yellow gold, polished one by one to remove the PVD coating, and the sun, in micro-blasted gold with polished rays. In keeping with watchmaking tradition, all finishing operations on the RM 88 Smiley are carried out by hand.
Such splendour of colour and scenography, both front and back, deserved a setting that would do justice to the composition. The case is made of white ATZ ceramic — well-known for its resistance to scratches, shocks and abrasion, and its eternal whiteness — whilst red gold was employed for the case.
