The first MB&F Horological Machine from MB&F was HM1, which was launched in 2007. Since then, we have seen eight more, along of course with the release of a myriad of other timepieces – clocks and watches both – from MB&F, which were not Horological Machines per se. The basic idea behind the Horological Machines was to create watches which break the idea of a watch down into fragments and build those fragments back up again into something – well, hopefully, something rich and strange, to paraphrase Shakespeare. Today, MB&F introduces the tenth Horological Machine, which combines the signature playful design and very serious watchmaking so characteristic of the HM series in a new way. The new Machine, HM10, is called the Bulldog.
The Bulldog combines several elements found in other watches from MB&F Horological Machine . The most immediately apparent are the timekeeping displays. Convex surfaces printed with numbers and which rotate on their axes to show the hours and minutes first appeared in the form of cones in HM3, and they were given a hemispherical shape in the HM3 “Frog,” which is maybe my favorite Horological Machine of them all. They make a return in the Bulldog and are accompanied by a design element which, prior to HM10, had been found only in the more traditionally designed Legacy Machines. This element is the balance wheel, which is suspended under a high-arched bridge and which appears to float above the plane of the dial.
The “Bull” in Bulldog comes partly from the configuration of the two crowns, which sit above the dial and which project outward like the horns of a bull. Usually, when it occurs in chronographs, this is referred to as a bullhead configuration. Here, the two crowns aren’t there to operate a chronograph. Instead, one crown, the left, is used to wind power into the mainspring (power reserve is 45 hours) and the other, on the right, to set the two domes to the correct time. The domes are made of extremely thin aluminum, so as to reduce as much as possible to a minimum the energy costs of driving them. And the watch has a unique power reserve display.
If the crowns are the dog’s ears and the domes its eyes, the power reserve is its jaw. Winding the mainspring causes the jaw to gradually open and as the mainspring winds down, the jaws close. The power reserve is located on the underside of the case, but thanks to the arrangement of the lugs and strap as well as its three-dimensionality, it can easily be seen when the watch is being worn – a private pleasure for the owner, as it’s not visible topside.
As is generally the case with the Horological Machines, the Bulldog is a fairly large watch, at 54mm x 45mm x 24mm. MB&F Horological Machine , however, does intend for its watches to be worn (indeed I have always felt that to own one and leave it in a safe or on a winder most of the time would be to miss a lot of the fun of owning one) and the Bulldog is equipped with articulated lugs that let the watch sit comfortably on wrists over a range of sizes.
The “engine” for HM10 (as MB&F likes to call its movements) is in-house, which is not terribly surprising when you consider the odds of finding a bulldog-jaw-power-reserve, elevated balance, time-dome-equipped off-the-shelf movement. A number of individuals worked on the various aspects of the movement; Simon Brette at MB&F led the movement development team. The overall concept for the watch is of course from Max Büsser, MB&F’s founder, with design by renowned watch designer Eric Giroud.
The HM10 Bulldog will be available in two versions. One has a grade 5 titanium body and blue “eyes” while the other will be in red gold, with black “eyes.”
The “engine” for HM10 (as MB&F likes to call its movements) is in-house, which is not terribly surprising when you consider the odds of finding a bulldog-jaw-power-reserve, elevated balance, time-dome-equipped off-the-shelf movement. A number of individuals worked on the various aspects of the movement; Simon Brette at MB&F led the movement development team. The overall concept for the watch is of course from Max Büsser, MB&F’s founder, with design by renowned watch designer Eric Giroud.
The HM10 Bulldog will be available in two versions. One has a grade 5 titanium body and blue “eyes” while the other will be in red gold, with black “eyes.”
The Bulldog is a watch I’m very grateful for as a watch writer – it is so far removed from the ordinary run of modern watchmaking, so far divorced from the risk-averse pseudo-innovation and lack of imagination common to much modern watchmaking. At the same time, it’s a very dangerous kind of watchmaking to do, and it requires constantly winning over the hearts and minds of a relatively small and very fickle group of collectors globally. The number of possible clients for any MB&F watch is small not only in terms of the cost of the watches but also in terms of tastes. It takes a lot of conviction for someone to spend six figures on the sort of mechanical flights of fancy that are MB&F’s stock in trade – and a tremendous amount of conviction for MB&F to continue producing them.
The Bulldog is an extremely interesting watch on a number of levels: It’s fascinating just taken as a very wild riff on what a watch can be, it’s mechanically and functionally interesting, and it also represents a combination of elements from MB&F’s watchmaking history which have never before been put together in a single watch. In some respects, the titanium version might be the more wearable on a semi-daily basis, but I have always enjoyed MB&F’s horological machines in red gold – somehow it seems to really bring out the case geometry. The Bulldog also does something which, in addition to being enjoyable in its own right, is a symptom of how good MB&F is at storytelling. It makes me wonder what happens next.