Belgium is famous for many of its exports. Belgian beer, Belgian chocolate and thanks to Ressence, Belgian watches. There is quite honestly nothing on the market that comes close to what Ressence are doing in terms of design with their innovative Ressence Orbital Convex System (ROCS). A system that means the entire dial rotates to display the time. The closest analogy would be the carrousel movements of a brand like Ulysse Nardin, which are aesthetically very different. Ressence have announced the launch of their slimmest model ever, the new Type 9.
The new watch, available in either grey or aqua, is essentially a redesign of the Type 8 from 2022. The fundamental change is that they’ve moved the minute scale from being around the edge of the dial to being on the bezel, eliminating the need for there to be a double ring around the edge of the design and slimming the watch considerably. The Type 9 measures 39mm x 11mm as opposed to the Type 8 at 42.9mm x 11mm. It’s a substantial boost in wearability and comfort on the wrist.
I also really like the appearance of having the minute scale on the bezel, it works really well. Especially in the grey edition where the circular brushing on both the hour and minute scale stands out great against the matte dial. The grey tone complements the titanium case too, which is a nice touch. It’s worth noting that the aqua edition is cool as well but there’s something about the monochrome edition that speaks to me more.
If you’re unfamiliar with Ressence, the way the ROCS display works is that the entire dial rotates to display the time. The main portion of the dial serves as the minutes indicator while the subdial shows the hours. The trick is that the hour scale itself also rotates counter to the rotation of the main dial in order to stay oriented on a single axis, meaning it’s always read from the same position. As this is Ressence’s most minimalist design that’s fairly intuitive, however Ressence also produce watches with up to three subdials like the recent Type 3 BB2 where the ROCS concept really comes into play.
The movement powering the piece is called the ROCS 9, a modified ETA 2892/2 with a custom module. Due to the power intensive nature of the orbital display, it only has a 36-hour power reserve, which is supplied by an automatic rotor. Alternatively, you can manually wind it using the caseback, another Ressence signature element.
Both the aqua and grey editions of the Type 9 are priced at CHF 12,500 (approx. £11,160), which is a substantial number. It’s understandable given the difficulty of engineering the ROCS display and its unusual novelty. On the other hand, being a novelty can sometimes work against Ressence as they are occasionally likened to being an expensive toy. However, considering they are still innovating with their designs, collectors are evidently lapping them up.
Price and Specs:
More details at Ressence.
