Elegant, ornate, or sporty: luxury timepieces always commit to a look worth showing off. Yet the real highlight usually stays hidden: the masterfully crafted automatic movement. Open heart watches give the art of watchmaking a stage on the dial and offer a glimpse of the inner workings - with designs ranging from subtle to boldly revealing.
A Confident Bow to Watchmaking Tradition: Tissot T-Classic Le Locle Powermatic 80 Open Heart
The collection, whose name refers to the brand's Swiss hometown, is conceived as a tribute to traditional watchmaking craftsmanship . The automatic watch with its 39.3 mm case does that idea full justice. As classic as the two-tone look is the hobnail pattern on the dial, also known as Clous de Paris guilloché. The same goes for the open balance wheel at 12 o'clock - the original form of the open balance design. It's hard to imagine an occasion that this men's watch, with its gleaming stainless steel and rose gold-tone accents, wouldn't suit.
If you'd still rather take it off on the weekend, you'll be glad to know that the caliber in these open heart watches has earned its showcase. With its 80-hour power reserve and antimagnetic Nivachron balance spring, it ranks among the more recent masterpieces of watchmaking. The icing on the cake: the manufacturer brings cutting-edge production techniques into play so that the timelessly elegant Tissot T-Classic Le Locle Powermatic 80 Open Heart, with its elaborately engraved exhibition caseback, fits the budget of many watch lovers.
Purist at Heart – Rado True Secret
Utterly minimalist and innovative on the outside, highly complex and steeped in tradition on the inside: this open heart watch is the purest distillation of what the brand is valued for. Rado revolutionized the watch world in 1986 with its expert use of high-tech ceramic for cases and bracelets. The ultra-light, comfortable, and hypoallergenic material shows to best effect on the Rado True Secret, because the dial matches its dark color and goes without indices.
This uncompromising purism highlights another special feature of these 40 mm unisex watches: the open balance wheel. Perfectly round at 12 o'clock, it makes clear that innovative material design and a mechanical movement are not at odds. Quite the opposite: just like the design of open balance watches, the automatic caliber with its 80-hour power reserve has evolved - and you can admire it through the sapphire caseback. On a woman's or a man's wrist, these ceramic watches are an unconventional style statement that makes hearts beat faster.
Open Balance in a Modern Style - Hamilton Jazzmaster Open Heart Auto
The open heart design with a circular cutout has become established, but it isn't set in stone. The luxury brand with American roots proves it: the smoky blue dial with its dynamic gradient draws the eye like a magnet, so no one misses the striking display of the movement. Through the elegantly shaped cutouts you can see not only the open balance wheel but several parts of the movement - without taking the watch off and looking through the exhibition caseback.
The views are more dramatic than on classic open heart watches, while legibility is easier than on "true" skeleton watches. Those would reveal the automatic movement across the entire dial. The movement in question is an H-10 caliber with an 80-hour reserve, based on the ETA C07.111 and known as the "Powermatic 80." Hats off: the Hamilton Jazzmaster Open Heart Auto brings a real breath of fresh air to watch design without compromising the understated grace of an automatic watch.
A Brilliant Feat of Skeletonizing and Polishing - Rado True Automatic Open Heart
Boundaries are fluid - watch genres included. On this unisex watch, the open balance wheel is the first thing to catch your eye, as befits an open balance concept. Shortly after, you discover the gold-toned wheel around the center of the hands and the two circular cutouts beneath it. Only at second glance does it become clear that the matte black dial isn't geometrically patterned but is pierced by loosely scattered "windows" onto the movement.
This aha moment owes as much to the restrained color scheme as to the clear indices. They invite you to focus on the essentials first and read the time. In doing so, you discover almost in passing how exciting the design of the Rado True Automatic Open Heart is, while its overall impression remains pleasantly understated. And it has another surprise in store: the bracelet's chrome-like sheen suggests stainless steel, but like the case it is made of plasma high-tech ceramic.
Fortune Favors the Bold: Open Heart Watches from Zenith
Ever since Georges Favre-Jacot rethought watch production in 1865, Zenith has been one of the most highly acclaimed manufactures. Yet its reputation never tempted it to sit back and relax. Instead, the heritage brand became the epitome of innovation - both technical and aesthetic. That also applies to the art of open heart and skeleton watches. The Zenith Chronomaster El Primero Open brilliantly demonstrates that a chronograph, too, can offer views that go beyond an open balance wheel. Just as daring is the design of the Zenith Defy 21 collection, above all the limited-edition Chroma II. This open heart watch with a 44 mm ceramic case showcases the automatic movement in rainbow colors, cheekily winking at the viewer between the hands and indices.
The bold design is matched by the inner workings of this chronograph with its transparent caseback: the El Primero caliber, comprising 293 components, beats at 36,000 vibrations per hour and offers a power reserve of more than two days. Thanks to independent regulating organs for the chronograph function and timekeeping, it impresses with 1/100th-of-a-second precision. It would be a shame if milestones like the Zenith Chronomaster El Primero Open or the Defy 21 didn't embrace the open heart concept, wouldn't it?
Open Heart Bonus Tip for Fans of the Extravagant
When the Hamilton Ventura debuted in 1957, it was eccentric on two counts. It was the first wristwatch to run on a battery and to embrace a futuristic-tinged asymmetry. Wait a minute - isn't that a balance wheel peeking out on this open balance watch? That's right! The design icon dared to return to the proven realm of mechanical automatic watches, making it even more unusual. Wear it to complete your outfit and you position yourself as a connoisseur of watch designs that truly rock: the Ventura became famous on Elvis Presley's wrist in the musical comedy Blue Hawaii.
