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Ratchet wheels were the usual hardware of automatic winding in 1957, and Girard Perregaux chose to leave them out. The word printed under the signature on this Girard Perregaux Gyromatic is the name the company gave that decision, and the watch carries it on a black and white dial that gives no other hint of what is inside.
The company, based in La Chaux-de-Fonds, presented the Gyromatic system that year. In place of the ratchet wheels that automatic movements of the period relied on to turn the back and forth motion of the oscillating weight into winding, its researchers fitted unidirectional clutches equipped with rollers, parts that one later writer compared to coaster brakes. The arrangement used roller-equipped clutches to reduce idle travel in the winding system, an engineering choice rather than a change announced by extra hands on the dial. The same account calls the system simple, reliable and effective, and it was compact enough to suit a thin case. Thousands of Girard Perregaux watches carried the system over the following years, which is how a word coined for a winding mechanism became a model name printed on dials like this one.
The company still treats the year as a marker. When it reached its 225th anniversary in 2016 it issued a tribute model named simply 1957, a plain three hand date watch in the same restrained style rather than a revival of the mechanism itself.
What we like about this example is that the engineering stays entirely out of sight. A black center is ringed by a white minute track, the two tone layout that earns it the tuxedo description, and the only other interruptions are a framed date at three and the applied baton markers, with grooved markers at twelve and six. Nothing on the face announces the system except the one word.
The case is round stainless steel, 36.5mm across and 42.5mm from lug to lug, with a smooth bezel, straight projecting lugs, a raised crystal and a ridged crown carrying the GP monogram. The dial is signed GIRARD-PERREGAUX over GYROMATIC, with slim hands, a central seconds hand, the date window at three and Swiss lettering at its lower edge. Inside, the full rotor automatic movement is signed Girard Perregaux Gyromatic and marked twenty nine jewels, unadjusted. It comes on a black ostrich strap with an OTTUHR buckle, 18mm at the lugs, and fits wrists up to 8 inches.
