Cartier Rotonde Central Chronograph Watch

by Ariel Adams (RSS feed)
Jan 26th 2009 at 12:02PM

One of the more interesting new Cartier watches at SIHH 2009 this year is the Rotonde Central Chronograph. This watch uses Cartier's new in-house manually-wound 9907 MC calibre movement built in La Chaux de Fonds. The look of the watch is unique to say the least, with the centrally placed chronograph subdial measuring 30 minutes, with a disc that literally covers most of the hour and minute hand on the watch face.

The chronograph dial is very easy to read as all 30 minutes are displayed on the central revolving disc. The chronograph seconds are displayed on a thin blued hand that uses the middle 60 second ring. This means that there is no seconds hands for the main time. I think the watch suffers from a bit of concentric circle-itis. I count five functional rings on the face. I also feel as though the hour hand is too long, or the minute hand is too short. I can see this becoming a legibility issue for some people.

I do however approve of the large rectangular chronograph pushers, and the new interpretation of the traditional Cartier crown. See the bulbous sapphire crystal cabochon, and dotted periphery that decorate the crown. The dial features some guilloche engraving, while the 18k gold case complements the overall theme of the watch nicely.

Ariel Adams publishes the watch review site aBlogtoRead.com.

Tags: 9907 mc, 9907Mc, cartier, central chronograph, CentralChronograph, rotonde, sihh, timepiece, watch