For the Ladies: Breguet Tradition Dame 7038 Review

At Baselworld 2016, Breguet revealed their first ladies’ watch in the Tradition collection. The white gold watch with a burgundy alligator strap expanded into haute horology ladies watches. Typically highly-complicated watches are reserved for men, but Breguet bucked tradition and offered a ladies watch in the same high-end style.

Now, Breguet has announced they’re expanding Tradition Dame 7038 line with a 37mm rose gold watch with a white crocodile leather strap. This watch will be shown at Baselworld 2017, exactly a year after their reveal of the first Tradition Dame 7038.

Between the dial, the bezel, the case, and the crown, there’s quite a bit going on with this watch. However, all of the components fit together seamlessly to create a unique luxury timepiece. The bezel includes 68 brilliant-cut diamonds, the watch case features Breguet’s signature fluted band, and the crown embraces a ruby-red watch jewel.

As for the dial, the time is the primary focus with a mother of pearl dial, Clou de Paris hobnailing, and rose gold Breguet hands. I mention that the time is the focus, and that’s key. Oftentimes skeleton movements showcase the inner workings of the watch first and the time second. This does not occur with Breguet’s ladies watch. The symmetrical skeleton movement has its own spotlight without detracting from the traditional dial.

Despite being secondary, that does not make the skeleton movement inferior. No, in fact, you could spend hours looking at the details in this movement. The bridges are hand chamfered with polished edges, the rhodium-plated mainplate and bridges have a sandblasted texture, the barrel features an intricate rosette motif, and the screw heads all have a perfect black-polished, mirror-finished surface.

The movement is Breguet’s caliber 505SR, a self-winding movement with a 50-hour power reserve. Besides the hour and minutes, the watch also includes a retrogrades second indication at 10 o’clock. You can view the working movement from both ends since this watch includes a sapphire crystal caseback. The caseback shows the gold oscillating weight which is engraved with the same rosette motif as the barrel.