Donald Trump sells gold watch with tourbillon for $100,000. Wait, what?

Two hundred grams of gold. 122 diamonds. A prize of $100,000. And “TRUMP” on the dial.

Flashy, yes, but perhaps the most notable feature of a mechanical wristwatch launched by former President Trump last week is the anachronistic technology enveloping its beating heart: a tourbillon.

The device, which gave the watch its name, is an 18th-century invention intended to improve precision by neutralizing the effects of gravity on a watch's mechanism. To do this, it suspends the timing components in a rotating cage.

Although visually interesting, the Trump watch's tourbillon is displayed via a cutout on its dial, it is no longer functionally necessary, due to advances in watchmaking.

And yet, timepieces equipped with tourbillons have, for years, been synonymous with status and success. Prominent Swiss brands such as Patek Philippe and Audemars Piguet offer watches with tourbillons that cost more than $250,000. They've even found their way into the pop culture lexicon, getting verified in hip-hop songs, such as Disciple Zachariah's “Whirlwind,” which includes lyrics about being “hypnotized by the mechanism.” .

Trump, who this year only unveiled a $59.99 Bible, $399 shoes and $100 collectibles, said in a video Thursday that “this isn't just any watch; “is one of the best watches made.”

But among watch connoisseurs, the timepiece immediately sparked opprobrium. In Instagram posts, WhatsApp group chats and TikTok videos, influential voices criticized the solid gold watch because of its appearance and cost. Trump said only 147 would be made in two shades of gold.

In an online clip, Mike Nouveau, a vintage watch dealer with a strong online presence, calculated the value of some parts of the watch, a figure well below its retail price. He said the watch is equipped with an “out-of-the-box” tourbillon that costs less than $3,000.

Several industry experts said it made sense to include a tourbillon in Trump's watch.

“It's a nice mechanical parallel to Trump, he's a person who twirls, who's bright and flashy, but who has no function or purpose and is totally anachronistic in the way he sees the world,” said Phil Toledano, co-founder of the association. watch brand Toledano & Chan.

It could still sell, estimates Kevin O'Dell, a rare watch dealer based in the Washington area: “There are rich retirees who live in Florida, they have a few million in the bank and they love Trump. a bit the same person who buys a Rolex or a Patek because it’s a name, it’s a flex.”

Little is known about the manufacturer of the watch. A Trump Watches website, which also lists a sub-$1,000 offering called Fighter, says the timepieces are not “designed, manufactured, distributed or sold” by the former president or the Trump Organization.

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The Trump campaign referred the Times to his company, which did not respond to requests for comment. Emails sent to an address listed on the Trump Watches site were not returned.

Long a cloistered profession, watchmaking has experienced a period of democratization over the last decade. Emerging technologies have allowed more manufacturers to produce timepieces whose intricacies were once the preserve of a few august companies.

The swirl illustrates this change. While watches sporting them could once cost six figures, companies like TAG Heuer now offer versions priced under $25,000. Those made in China are even cheaper: the one from Seagull Watch Co. costs about $1,700.

“Any company can order a tourbillon off the shelf and stick it in their watch,” Nouveau told the Times.

A “whirlwind”

Tourbillon is the French word for “whirlwind,” an apt name for a device that lends a kinetic quality to the otherwise understated effort of timekeeping.

Abraham-Louis Breguet, widely considered the greatest watchmaker of all time, invented the tourbillon around 1795 and his eponymous company still makes them: his Classique Tourbillon Extra-Plat Automatique 5367, for example, costs more than $160,000.

But with comparable low-priced offerings from other brands, the tourbillon's shine has been dulled in the eyes of some insiders. Tony Traina, editor-in-chief of watch publication Hodinkee, said some serious watch collectors now hold the view that “tourbillions play themselves.”

Watches with tourbillons can also be considered as an ostentatious look against all those whirring pieces! which is a turnoff for some, Traina said.

This, however, was not a problem for Trump. He said in the video promoting the tourbillon watch that it contained “nearly 200 grams of gold and over 100 real diamonds. … I love gold. I love diamonds.”

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How much is all this gold and diamonds worth?

Nouveau said on Instagram that the value of 200 grams of gold was less than $13,000. And Jeremy Auslander, a partner at Los Angeles-based Roxbury Jewelry who reviewed images of the watch at the Times' request, estimated that it contained between 1 and 1.25 carats of diamonds. He said the retail price of these VS1 quality and clarity diamonds listed on the Trump Watches website is approximately $2,500 to $3,500.

Taking into account the price of the watch movement, a term for its mechanical components as well as its manufacturing costs, experts told the Times it would likely cost between $20,000 and $30,000 to make each one. them.

O'Dell, the watch dealer, noted that many traditional watchmakers enjoy similarly large margins: “Prices in this industry often don't match reality.” »

So who does it?

Even as observers trashed the watch, they wondered who was really behind it.

The Trump Watches website offered few clues.

But the Times tracked down the creator of the watch movement, Swiss watchmaker Olivier Mory of OM Mechanics. In an email interview, Mory said he was recruited by a “private label” company that buys his movements and produces the watches, adding: “We only found out about the end customer after we accepted the job”.

Mory, which makes several types of tourbillon movements, did not answer a question about the price of the one on the Trump watch, but said it cost between about $2,600 and $7,100, depending in part functions they include. He said he wasn't concerned about his moves being used by a Trump-linked brand.

“I don’t need to be interested in a foreign politician…I don’t see any reason to be ashamed as a movement producer,” Mory said.

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According to Trump Watches, its tourbillon watch will be made to order and shipped as early as this month. It is unclear whether working models were produced. The brand's website stated that “images shown are for illustration purposes only and may not be an exact representation of the product.”

This caught the attention of Mary Trump, the former president's niece and one of his most vocal critics. In a blog post, she said: “Taking advantage of the presidency in this way is truly grotesque.”

As for Mory, the Swiss watchmaker, he had his own vision of American politics: “The American political system is like coming from another planet.”

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This story was originally published in the Los Angeles Times.

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