Ulysse Nardin Super Freak – The Most Complicated Time-Only Watch | Watches & Wonders 2026

Tim Mosso kicks off Watches & Wonders 2026 with Ulysse Nardin's Matthew Haverland for an in-depth look at the watch that may be the most mechanically ambitious time-only piece ever made. The Super Freak is the culmination of 180 years of Ulysse Nardin and 25 years of the Freak — 511 components, a fully new in-house caliber, a new case, and even a new watch box. It is the world's first automatic double tourbillon, the first Freak to display seconds, and houses the smallest mechanical differential and gimbal ever created — not just in a watch, but in any device. The two flying tourbillons are each inclined at exactly 10 degrees — a deliberate aesthetic choice. Less would look too flat; more would look like a spaceship. Each tourbillon has its own silicon balance wheel with gold masses, and its own DIAMonSIL escapement running unlubricated thanks to a synthetic diamond coating on the silicon components. The differential averages the output of both regulators. A patented gimbal system — required just to drive the seconds display — transmits force at 90-degree angles via miniature bevel gears. The seconds indicator itself, a first for any Freak, is a rotating vertical cylinder on the minute hand. At 44mm in white gold, it's actually one millimeter smaller than the Freak S, with a non-integrated strap that sits better on the wrist than its predecessors. The blue Nanosital hour disc — transparent, backlit in blue — is the visual centerpiece. 30 meters of water resistance, lumines