Watch Paparazzi

Rapper Huang Zitao spotted wearing Richard Mille

Huang Zitao — rapper, actor, and one of the most high-profile watch collectors in Chinese pop culture — was recently photographed wearing the Richard Mille RM 65-01 Automatic Winding Split Seconds Chronograph, a piece that sits comfortably among the most technically ambitious releases the Le Brassus-meets-Les Breuleux manufacture has delivered in recent years.

The RM 65-01 is significant for a precise reason: it represents Richard Mille's first fully in-house automatic movement beating a split-seconds complication. The calibre RMAC4 is a skeletonised automatic winding movement — immediately visible through the open-worked dial — running at 28,800 vph with a power reserve of approximately 55 hours. The architecture is classically Richard Mille: a baseplate and bridges in grade 5 titanium, a variable-geometry rotor that allows the owner to tune winding efficiency to their activity level, and a function selector at 10 o'clock to switch between Winding, Neutral, and Hand-Setting modes without stressing the movement's delicate components. A rapid-winding system completes the practical brief.

The complication layout is dense but legible. Hours, minutes, and a small seconds hand sit at 6 o'clock; the split-seconds chronograph is activated by a dedicated pusher; a 30-minute counter occupies 3 o'clock and a 12-hour counter sits at 9 o'clock, with the date discreetly integrated. The tonneau case — 44.50 mm × 49.94 mm — is available in titanium, white gold, and red gold configurations, with the titanium version being the entry point for the reference.

For collectors, a split-seconds chronograph demands two independent, magnetically isolated chronograph wheels capable of being stopped independently and then re-engaged — a mechanism that pushes manufacturing tolerances to their limit. That Richard Mille achieved this inside an automatic, self-winding movement rather than a hand-wound calibre deepens the achievement considerably and explains why the RM 65-01 attracted immediate attention on release.

Huang Zitao has long gravitated toward Richard Mille, the brand functioning as a natural extension of his public persona — technically extreme, visually confrontational, and financially unambiguous. On the grey market, demand for the RM 65-01 has remained robust, with values trading meaningfully above retail across all case material variants.