Watch Paparazzi

Chef Massimo Bottura spotted wearing Breguet

Massimo Bottura, the Modena-based chef whose Osteria Francescana has claimed the top spot on the World's 50 Best Restaurants list, was recently spotted wearing the Breguet Tradition Power Reserve in white gold, reference 7057BB/G9/9W6 — a watch that wears its mechanical soul as openly as Bottura plates his reinterpretations of Italian culinary tradition.

The Tradition collection, introduced by Breguet in 2005, is among the most architecturally honest propositions in haute horlogerie. Rather than concealing the movement behind a conventional dial, the 7057 mounts the manually wound calibre 505SR movement so that its components — including the large going-train wheel, the off-center hour display, and the blued-steel power-reserve sector at 12 o'clock — are fully legible from the front. The 41 mm white gold case houses a movement with approximately 50 hours of power reserve, a silicon escape wheel for antimagnetic reliability, and Breguet's signature guilloché finishing on the peripheral chapter ring. The reference 7057BB/G9/9W6 pairs the white gold case with a silver-toned dial substrate and a dark leather strap, achieving a restrained elegance that avoids the showiness its technical complexity might invite.

For collectors, the Tradition line occupies a specific and respected niche: it is not a complications showcase in the conventional sense, but rather a statement about movement architecture and Breguet's intellectual legacy. Abraham-Louis Breguet invented the tourbillon, the perpétuelle (self-winding mechanism), the pare-chute shock absorber, and the sympathique clock — but his souscription watches, with their disciplined layouts and cost-conscious engineering, arguably reveal more about his design philosophy than any single complication. The 7057 channels that spirit directly.

Bottura's affinity for the piece is coherent. He has built a global reputation by stripping Italian cuisine to its conceptual foundations while demanding absolute technical precision — a methodology that mirrors what Breguet's Tradition collection does with watchmaking. The choice feels less like accessorizing and more like a considered statement of shared values between artisan traditions.

On the market, the Breguet Tradition 7057BB/G9/9W6 carries a retail price in the mid-to-upper range of the collection. Grey-market availability is moderate; white gold references hold value steadily given restrained production volumes and consistent demand from collectors who prioritize movement legibility over complication density.