250 Years of Innovation: Breguet’s Tradition Seconde Rétrograde 7035 Arrives

Paying homage to 250 years of technical and aesthetic innovation, Breguet has launched the Tradition 7035 timepiece. With a unique architecture that brings its precision mechanism to the forefront, the Tradition 7035, crowned by a handmade enamel dial, is crafted in Breguet gold, an exclusive alloy presented for the watchmaker’s 250th anniversary. The guilloché watch face in translucent blue grand feu enamel shows the hours and minutes, alongside a retrograde seconds display discreetly positioned between 10 o’clock and 11 o’clock. GMT India takes a closer look at why this anniversary novelty stands out. 

Breguet Gold and Breguet Blue

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This reference remains faithful to the Tradition collection’s geometric codes, combining Breguet’s technical and aesthetic expertise with meticulous in-house hand-finishing. The Tradition line incorporates two in-house colour codes: Breguet gold and Breguet blue. The warm radiance of Breguet gold is achieved by fusing gold, silver, copper, and palladium into an alloy. This exclusive alloy, created by Breguet, was introduced earlier this year with the Classique Souscription 2025 watch. 

The 38 mm case of the just-launched Tradition 7035 has been crafted from the new alloy. A specially developed plating treatment ensures that the mainplate and bridges are of the same hue as the case. The silver-coloured gears, blued screws, and ruby red jewels provide visual contrast and further accentuate the radiance of Breguet gold. The bridges of this new anniversary model feature, for the first time in the Tradition collection, a silky, hand-applied satin finish on their upper surfaces.

The finely engine-turned dial, resplendent in Breguet blue, serves as the model’s striking focal point, featuring the Quai de l’Horloge motif. Its tinted, translucent grand feu enamel is enriched with the same deep blue as the retrograde seconds hand and screws, which are made of blued steel. The Breguet Arabic numerals, the minute track with its stylised fleurs-de-lis, and the unique serial number at 4 o’clock stand out effortlessly in a contrasting silver against the shimmering azure enamel.

Quai de l’Horloge: A Unique Guilloché Decoration

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Guilloché, a decorative technique often used on watch cases, has gained recognition as an art form in its own right. A.-L. Breguet pioneered this technique to define the various displays on watch dials, and to this day, it remains a hallmark of Breguet’s expertise. The Maison currently owns the largest collection of working guilloché lathes in the world. These meticulously restored period machines can produce a range of motifs, from the traditional Clou de Paris to the contemporary Quai de l'Horloge design, incorporated into the dial of this Tradition model.

This new guilloché motif was inspired by the graceful lines of the Seine as it flows around the Île de la Cité, where A.-L. Breguet’s workshop once stood, and the Île Saint-Louis, both in the heart of Paris. The precise contours of this motif are modelled on the Turgot map, a meticulously detailed perspective view of Paris produced in the eighteenth century. For its time, it was remarkably accurate, depicting every street, building, and even each tree in the centre of Paris. 

Just as captivating as the front of the new Tradition 7035, its reverse unveils a golden landscape. The oscillating weight spins above the bridges’ satin-finished surfaces, which provide an elegant contrast to the shot-blasted mainplate below. The crescent moon-shaped weight, made of vertical brushed platinum, is reminiscent of those used in A.-L. Breguet’s time. He established the use of platinum in watchmaking, using it to optimise the automatic winding of what he referred to as his ‘perpétuelle’ watches, one of the first innovations from this master watchmaker. A discreet 'Pt950' engraving on the weight’s upper left flank serves as both a mark of quality and a subtle homage to Breguet’s patrimony.