Blancpain creates its first porcelain dial for the Year of the Rat
In celebration of the Chinese Year of the Rat Blancpain is unveiling its first watch with a porcelain dial entirely hand-crafted in its Métiers d'Art workshops. Issued in an eight-piece limited edition of one-of-a-kind timepieces, the special series marks the introduction of this traditional Chinese skill within the Manufacture in Le Brassus.
Creating a porcelain dial requires dexterity and patience. It involves several steps punctuated by long drying and firing phases, of which the last one serves to vitrify the porcelain and make it shiny, translucent and enduringly stable.
For this special edition featuring the effigy of the Rat, Blancpain combines the art of porcelain with enamel painting. Each animal and each decoration is painted freehand. A lengthy 1,200°C firing stage fixes the colors on the porcelain. The ability to achieve such a temperature, which would be impossible with an enamel dial on a gold base, opens up whole new fields of possibility in terms of both color and intensity.
With a 33 mm diameter white gold case featuring a bezel set with 48 brilliant-cut diamonds, the Métiers d'Art Porcelaine watches are powered by the 1154 automatic movement, whose exquisite finishes may be admired through a sapphire case-back.
