03 June 2014 | Hublot , 30 minutes on the wrist , Baselworld 2014

Back to the roots

The HUBLOT Classic Fusion 8 days Power Reserve Titanium

Those who recently discovered the HUBLOT brand, are passionate about sports, mainly soccer, basketball or Formula One to cite a few, they're most likely attracted to timepieces such as the King Power or the Big Bang, two collections that may be regarded  as the flagships of the brand and are the result of the extraordinary work of product marketing the entire world of horology recognizes to Jean-Claude Biver, the father of today's HUBLOT.

If you were born in the seventies', however, you have a passion for haute horologerie from your father and that for interior design from your mother, you might have probably spent hours reading Architectural Digest which not only was a reference in the matter but was rather the place where the most important watch brands used to advertise their new products. Among them, in the early 80s, was HUBLOT.

HUBLOT was the first brand to have  launched a luxury timepiece equipped with a rubber strap. That concept, over the years, has turned into an entire collection which seems, sometimes, to have passed almost in unnoticed when compared to those models promoted by the brand's ambassadors, while it boasts an endless series of versions and aims at traditional watch enthusiasts, for whom HUBLOT is just synonymous with a round case and a six H-shaped screws locked bezel.

The HUBLOT Classic Fusion Power Reserve 8 days Titanium for 2014 is reminiscent of the original HUBLOT. It seems unchanged, while it is profoundly different, since the HUBLOT Classic Fusion Power Reserve 8 days Titanium summarizes all the best technologies developed by HUBLOT, a brand which, by the way, boasts a material science department that could easily be a part of an aeronautical agency.

The round case, made of satin and polished titanium, is 45mm wide. A round bezel, made out of King Gold, a proprietary alloy of 95% Gold and 5% Platinum, is secured to the case and features two lateral black composite resin lugs. The indexes are applied on the dial, as it is the Power Reserve scale, placed at 10 o' clock.

A complication, this, which suggests the caliber HUB1601 mechanical with 192 hours of Power Reserve and a thickness of just 4,40mm, visible through the transparent sapphire case back, is manual wind. A movement that ensures this is one of HUBLOT's thinnest timepieces. Where's the rubber gone? It's still there but it is not alone, as the HUBLOT Classic Fusion Power Reserve 8 days Titanium's strap is made of alligator on the outside and sewn to the inner part made of natural rubber.

(Photo credit: Google; Horbiter's proprietary photo shooting)

Gaetano C. @Horbiter - Watches & Luxury

TWITTER @Gaetano Cimmino

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