The Quantième Annuel proves Berneron isn’t a one-trick pony – not that anyone was worried

These days, it seems like every week a new independent brand pops up on Instagram, with an empty profile announcing some big future thing coming up through mysterious, vague posts. A quick search of their name will reveal an impressive CV, whether it be as a restorer of old, complicated clocks, or mentioning the workbenches of some renowned complication-maker. Berneron’s story is not too dissimilar in terms of teasing before their first design was unveiled, though Sylvain Berneron’s background is more heavily design-focused, which made sense, seeing the gold-bathed, asymmetrical Mirage.

In a time when oddly shaped watches have become all the rage, you wouldn’t blame Berneron for adding yet another size or stone dial to the Mirage or continuing to use the winning formula in some way. And yet, his second watch couldn’t be any more different at first glance, though delving deeper, it’s so very clearly a product of Sylvain Berneron’s inventive mind.

A very different second act

The Mirage celebrated being deceptively simple, with its engineering challenge posing plenty of difficulty for a watch with no complications, maximising what could be packed into as small a movement as possible and shrinkwrapping the case around it in a way that was beautiful still. In some ways, it brought mechanical convenience that subverted all else to it – apart from being made from as much gold as possible.

The new Berneron Quantième Annuel clearly departs from that design approach, with its form following function in a completely different way. Rather than jam-packing as big of a barrel as he could into an impossibly small space, Berneron set out to make the most idiot-proof calendar watch possible as an introduction into the new Quantième collection, prioritising legibility and mechanical robustness.

This all starts with the dial – what’s the point of having a beautifully made calendar watch if you really have to try very hard to distinguish which date the several millimetre-long sub-dial hand is actually pointing at? Enter Berneron’s new “cross architecture” display, which splits the time and date readouts across two axes. Along the y-axis, you’ll find the time, starting with the jumping hours in a wide-open aperture at 12 o’clock, followed by a central minutes with a circle-counterweighted hand, and finishing with the small seconds register at the bottom that also integrates a day/night indicator.

So, from the pic below, we can deduce it’s 11:09:37. Looking from left to right along the x-axis, the calendar readout is simpler still, reading out the day of the week in the left aperture, the date in the centre indicated by a retrograde hand, and finishing with the month just next to the crown.

Now that we’ve familiarised ourselves with the layout, has Berneron managed to combine form and function? While it’s certainly very different from the Mirage – though with the same sector-like signatures and an off-centre brand name – I’d go for a resounding yes. It’s not following conventions and may thus appear a little odd at first, but I find it hard to deny that it is very pretty. I’m happy that I got to spend most of my time with the watch checking out the silver and blue version, as I do prefer it to the black (both naturally painted on solid gold blanks and with white gold hands), but if the high-contrast look isn’t quite for you, there is a more monochromatic option.

An innovative case

Berneron’s extensive use of precious metals doesn’t end with the Quantième Annuel, which is cased in (mostly) 950 platinum with a dash of (gasp) 904L stainless steel. Now, Berneron isn’t the first brand to combine the two, but it might have some of the most reasonable reasoning for doing so. A total of six components are hewn of steel, acting as a sort of shield over the case that’s mostly platinum (85% of its total weight), covering the tops of the bezel and each lug, as well as the centre of the crown.

Berneron’s reasoning for this? While I’m sure many prospective buyers have already reserved a prime spot in their safes, the company is actually hoping they’ll be wearing their watches, and platinum isn’t exactly known for its propensity to protect against scratches. As a result, the most high-wearing areas of the watch have been covered in 904L steel, and made easily replaceable in case you want a refresh at your next service.

Size-wise, the Quantième Annuel sits at 38mm in diameter, 10mm in height, and 45mm lug-to-lug. These are not just perfect dimensions for what’s considered fashionable nowadays, but also make the watch inobtrusive and able to mould to any wrist, as long as you’re fine not really being able to forget you’re wearing a big ol’ hunk of platinum (and gold, and steel…)

While the aforementioned construction would indicate an overcomplicated design, the Quantième Annuel is actually surprisingly tame, with only some stepped design features that also highlight its steel and platinum construction. Both correctors have been neatly integrated into the case flanks at 4 and 8 o’clock, though not fully hidden and by extension accessible only by a pin that you’ll forget as soon as you store the box. This was another conscious design choice by the Berneron team, and it’s one I can certainly stand behind.

The movement (oh, what a movement)

If you’re interested in seeing the movement that Berneron has come up with to allow for this new dial layout (and really, you should be), you’ll have to press the spring-loaded crown pusher and swing open the officer’s caseback. Before I talk about what’s beneath, the thing I noticed immediately when handling the watch was that Berneron designed the hinge to allow a near 180-degree opening angle, rather than that awkward, 90-degree position that so many brands seem to be content with. Not only does this make photography easier, but it just seems like a no-brainer to allow your customers to admire your handiwork. And admire they should, considering how much work has gone into the new Calibre 595.

First off the bat, I need to address that this is not a perpetual calendar. I’d quote Sylvain directly here as to why he decided against it, but fear his verbiage might’ve indicated this was more of an off-the-record comment – saying he called it unnecessarily complicated paints a good enough, if not quite as colourful picture. So, which complications does Sylvain deem necessary for a calendar watch that’s easy to use and hard to damage? For starters, the movement is clever enough to jump to, say, February 1st rather than February 31st, in case you accidentally pushed the month corrector on the last day of January.

The crown allows you to adjust the time and the retrograde date in any direction you please, while the day and month pushers quickly cycle through the stacked discs. The movement’s two barrels provide enough torque for all indications to jump instantaneously, whether it’s just one at a time, or all five on the midnight of December 31st. Finally, to save you the trouble of winding it too often, the power reserve sits at a healthy 100 hours.

Of course, we can’t talk about the 595 and not mention how stunning it looks. Just like the Mirage movement, the bridges and mainplate are 18k gold, while the overall architecture is less an exercise in space conservation and more in mimicking the symmetry of the dial. Operating the crown will set in motion the horizontally positioned train of the crown wheel, then the sonnerie-style click, and finally the ratchet sitting atop the first barrel, which is serially connected to the second.

You can see that second barrel peeking out beneath the Berneron plaque, diametrically opposed to the full-bridge, variable inertia balance, which just looks stunning set against a grained backdrop. Overall, the finishing is stunning, with guilloché on the gold bridges that looks better than any Geneva striping I’ve seen, black-polished steel components such as the screw heads and round-polished balance bridge, and naturally, hand-made bevelling.

Closing thoughts

It’s limited production, it’s spicily priced, but I really struggle to think of anything on this watch that would deserve to mar the hype Berneron has garnered. I’m sure that the brand could’ve gone ahead and made an even more impressively complicated watch – something Biver-style like a carillon tourbillon – but this watch really cements the fact that Berneron and Co. are looking to do what they want to do in the way they want to do it. Thankfully for them, it seems like the general watch crowd is pretty fond of it, and just like any other ungrateful kid at Christmas, I’m already looking forward to seeing the Berneron Fiasco, slated to launch in September 2027. Maybe I’ll be able to afford that one.

Berneron Quantième Annuel pricing and availability

The Berneron Quantième Annuel will be produced in 24 pieces per colour, per year. The pricing structure is staggered, starting at CHF 120,000 for 2025 and 2026, and going up in CHF 10,000 increments for 2027 and 2028, peaking at CHF 140,000.