WITH A TOTAL OF 1,483 PARTS AND 36 FEATURES OTHER THAN ITS TIME AND DATE INDICATORS, THE AETERNITAS MEGA 4 IS TOUCHED BY BOTH MAGIC AND GENIUS

BY MATT SCANLON

The most “complicated” wristwatch in the world embracing both meanings of that word as it applies in maker circles Franck Muller’s Aeternitas Mega 4 is a tribute to its namesake designer. Muller is unofficially referred to in the industry as the “master of complications,” a term that broadly applies to any feature in a mechanical timepiece beyond its display of hours and minutes, and the Aeternitas is truly an adventure in multifunction. Among this marvel’s 36 such features (though only 25 are visible) is a Westminster chime striking work, perpetual calendar, a minute repeater, a mono push piece split second chronograph, and day date, leap year, and moon phase indicators. It requires 1,483 components and five years’ work in order to assemble, but the result is wondrous, and among the perhaps half dozen most expensive regularly produced watches on the planet.

A first prize winner in the Genève Watch Making Grand Prix, Muller, along with this young company’s co-founder, Vartan Sirmakes, offers lines that begin with 200 component timepieces, and thrills in his extremes. The pair’s work is a tribute, they say, to 19th century masters of western Switzerland’s Vallée de Joux, nestled in the Jura Mountains and still the cradle of some of the finest watchmaking in the world (including brands Audemars Piguet, Jaeger LeCoultre, and Breguet). Their finest design’s name, Aeternitas (Latin for “eternity”) isn’t a boast, either, as its 1,000 year calendar complication is actually renewable to infinity.

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