hautlence retrovision ‘85 watch flips into a miniature robot

Retrovision ‘85 at Watches and Wonders 2025

Hautlence reveals Retrovision ‘85 at Watches and Wonders 2025, a watch that flips into a miniature robot around the wrist. It pays homage to a design from a ‘well-known Japanese toy manufacturer,’ as the brand describes it. The Hautlence miniature-robot watch features a self-winding movement from the Vagabonde Tourbillon collection. Its design even evokes retrofuturism. Once the user transforms the Hautlence watch into a miniature robot, they see the display clearly, featuring a central-minute disc with three-hour satellites rotating around it.

There’s a button that the wearer clicks to unfold the timepiece design. The robot shows its form then. Its head unfurls, and its arms and legs stretch out. At the center, time-telling is unconventional than the typical watches. There aren’t any watch hands. Instead, the minutes are at the top of the central disc. Then, the numbers written on the minute markers are the seconds for the timer. Their starting point is at the bottom rather than at the top.

all images courtesy of Hautlence

Hautlence retro-designed watch encased in a miniature robot

The hours of the timepiece appear as the three-hour rotating satellites on the dial, which orbit around the central disc. When the users unfold the timepiece, the three purple discs rotate as if they were dancing. The design team places sapphire crystal at the rear of the Hautlence watch that turns into a miniature robot. Through this, the wearer can see the mechanism operate from the outside. For the case, bezel, and crown, the design team uses 3D printing and titanium for them all, with partial copper-colored PVD coating. The base dial also emerges from titanium with a frosted finish. As for the intermediate dial, it features rhodium-plated brass with blue and purple PVD.

The minute discs come with sapphire as well and applied numerals and Globolight rings. The straps are black rubber with a steel pin buckle. There are a total of 217 components and 39 jewels for the timepiece model. The Hautlence Retrovision ‘85 watch encased in a miniature robot pays tribute to the early days of cartoon and anime shows. It’s the period pixelated graphics in video games and the boom of skateboarding culture. The design team describes their creation as ‘a robot watch inspired by the iconic design of the original, but with a mechanical movement equipped with a flying tourbillon.’ So far, the timepiece design is limited to only eight units in total.

the Hautlence miniature-robot watch features a self-winding movement from the Vagabonde Tourbillon series