Bugatti Chiron Tourbillon Black and Orange

I was under the impression that Jacob & Co.’s Opera Godfather was the tackiest timepiece ever created by hand of man. And it was! But the New York jeweler’s just-released $560k Jacob & Co. Bugatti Chiron Tourbillon Baguette Black and Orange Sapphires raises the bar. How can that be, you ask. The basic Bug’s been around a while. In fact, last year, Jacob & Co. introduced three variations . . .

<

The Twin Turbo Furious Bugatti 300+, the Twin Turbo Furious Bugatti La Montre Noir, and the Bugatti Chiron Tourbillon (operating instructions above).

All three riffs on the original BC are WAY too tasteful. Not tasteful per se. How could a watch designed to replicate the Chiron’s 8.0-liter 16-cylinder engine be anything but absurd? Even so, the three horological Bugs are Mozart to the Opera Godfather’s earworm.

Feast your eyes on the unbridled magnificence that is the Jacob & Co. Bugatti Chiron Tourbillon Baguette White, for example.

Sure, the death-by-diamonds ensemble is more over-the-top than anything Swiss haute horlogerie can muster (and God knows they try). But when it comes to velvet Elvis-class tackiness, the barely tri-tone timepiece lacks a certain je ne sais quoi. The Bugatti Chiron Tourbillon Baguette White is – dare I say it – plain.

The Bugatti Chiron Tourbillon Baguette Black and Orange Sapphires takes Jake’s diamond-laden ode to a 1500 horsepower engine to the next level. The changes to the watch’s basic design are subtle but oh-so-important.

The new watch’s bright orange Bugatti logos pop like a porn star. But that’s not the half of it. The crowns are literally surrounded by black sapphires. The 42 orange baguette sapphires crazy paved above the crowns make the white diamonds more spectacular, more special than those on the Baguette White.

In this setting, Jacob & Co.’s bizarro-bonkers “engine” finally gets it due. The suck-ups at upscaleliving.com describe the show . . .

Push the right-hand crown of the timepiece, and the engine roars to life with 16 tiny pistons and a minuscule solid steel crankshaft moving up and down just like a regular mill. Two “turbochargers” (down from four in the actual Chiron engine) on the side of the engine block spin while the engine runs.

Roars. Right. As the video above illustrates, the Jacob & Co. Bugatti Chiron Tourbillon Baguette’s engine is a wind-up toy that requires winding between exhibitions. Never mind. Clock the little gas gauge power reserve indicator keeping track the 578-piece movement’s 60-hour run time. Orange shock absorbers? As Sally said in the diner, yes, yes, yes, yes!

Just as beauty is in the eye of the beholder, kitsch is a profoundly personal classification. I’d say the Jacob & Co. Bugatti Chiron Tourbillon Baguette Black and Orange Sapphires beats the Opera Godfather by dint of its killer combination of colorful exuberance and unabashed literalism. And yet, hard as it is to believe, Jacob & Co. have just introduced an even tackier watch than this. Stay tuned . . .