The Sartory Billard Des Bulles; Let’s Drink to That

In the UK or the States, asking a friend if they fancy a drink at 4 pm in the afternoon usually implies you've had an absolute shocker of a day at work, that it's a bank holiday, or a stag do has gotten entirely out of hand. In France, however, it is simply Tuesday. The French call it the apéro – a beautifully civilised daily habit where everyone just downs tools for a bit to gather around a table with a glass of something crisp. Often, that ritual begins with a simple question: “Des bulles?” Literally translating to “some bubbles?” It’s the universal French invitation to share a flute of champagne. And why on earth not?!

Forget the fact that this is an alcoholic drink. It’s not about that. This moment, dedicated to bubbles, serves as the foundation for the latest release from Sartory-Billard: the SB04-E ‘Des Bulles’.

There are beautiful ways to capture the spirit of a drink in watch design. You have brands that go all-in on tactile finishing—think of Seiko burying those sharp, sunburst guilloché patterns under thick layers of gloss lacquer. Then you have the more eccentric route, like those vintage Ernest Borel pieces that use wildly hypnotic, rotating discs to bring the entire dial to life. Armand Billard, on the other hand, simply chose to look straight down into a freshly poured flute of champagne. Between the clever use of texture and those shifting dials, it just goes to show how well the worlds of watchmaking and a good drink actually mix.

Happy Hour: The Des Bulles Dial

Bringing this bubbly, top-down concept to life meant calling in the big guns. Billard teamed up with his go-to guy, Tatsuya Todo (aka Kosetsu). Based in Ishikawa, Japan, Todo has been an officially certified lacquerware master since 1995. But don't let the traditional title fool you; he’s no museum-piece copycat. He loves taking ancient techniques and giving them a totally modern spin. For the 'Des Bulles' dial, Todo used an incredibly meticulous art form called raden. He started with a deep, midnight-black lacquer base and individually placed tiny, hand-cut circles of mother-of-pearl onto it. By making the circles bigger at the edges and shrinking them as they get closer to the centre, he pulled off a brilliant optical illusion. Gazing into this dial is just like staring at shiny champagne bubbles floating up from the dark depths of a glass.

Because mother-of-pearl is naturally iridescent, the dial is completely schizophrenic in the best possible way. Depending on how the light hits your wrist, the "bubbles" flash with neon hits of turquoise, violet, green, and pink, only to plunge back into muted darkness a second later. Every single fragment is selected, cut, and positioned by hand. There’s no stamping, no mass production, and no cutting corners. As a result, each of the 26 dials is entirely unique.

To anchor the champagne theme without ruining the subtlety, Billard added a double white line to suggest the rim of the glass. At the odd hours, conventional markers have been binned in favour of tiny, stylised champagne flutes, each releasing its own microscopic trail of bubbles. Even the numeral typography borrows heavily from the expressive, looping fonts found on vintage champagne labels. At the same time, new spear-shaped hands hover above the lacquer so as not to distract from Todo's handiwork.

Proportions Done Right

Keeping all this visual theatre in check is the familiar Sartory-Billard SB04 case. For anyone who firmly believes that a watch should actually fit a real human wrist, the dimensions here are a total dream. The stainless steel case clocks in at a flattering 39.5mm wide, with a super-tight lug-to-lug distance of just 44mm. Best of all? It’s a mere 10.2mm thick, so you can easily slide it under a dress shirt cuff at a dinner party, which is exactly where a watch this gorgeous belongs. Plus, the case mixes brushed and polished finishes beautifully, keeping all the attention where it belongs.

Heart vs Art 

Inside that steel case is the Swiss-made La Joux-Perret G101A automatic engine. It brings a very practical 68 hours of power reserve to the table alongside a smooth 4Hz beat rate. Sure, there will be hardcore movement snobs lurking in the forum comment sections who will inevitably complain that for a watch just short of £9000, they want a completely bespoke, built-from-scratch calibre. But honestly? They’re missing the point. You aren’t buying this for a ground-breaking gear train. The Japanese art speaks for itself on your wrist. The G101A is a rock-solid, reliable workhorse that keeps the case delightfully slim and ensures the watch actually works when you grab it off your Barrington watch winder for a Friday night out. The watch is secured to the wrist via either a navy blue rubber strap or a stainless-steel bracelet equipped with quick-release pins and a micro-adjustment clasp.

The real challenge in acquiring one of these watches is their exclusivity. The 'Des Bulles' is a limited run of just 26 numbered pieces, available exclusively through Martin Pulli Fine Jewellery and Watches in the United States. This actually marks the third time Sartory-Billard, Martin Pulli, and Tatsuya Todo have collaborated, following the wildly successful SB07 Maki-e and the SB04-E Small Bang. It was, after all, Pulli who pushed for the open composition without a metal chapter ring and the introduction of the new handset.

Ironically, Martin Pulli’s boutique is in the Manayunk neighbourhood of Philadelphia, named after a native Lenape word that literally translates to "place to drink." For a watch born from the French invitation to share a glass of champagne, you honestly couldn't script a better coincidence. Cheers to that.