Zenith has unveiled its most technically ambitious DEFY Skyline to date, introducing the manufacture's first fully openworked tourbillon within the collection. Presented at LVMH Watch Week 2026 in Milano, the DEFY Skyline Tourbillon Skeleton in rose gold represents a compelling synthesis of skeletonized architecture and high-frequency precision, rendered in a striking contrast of warm precious metal and luminous blue finishing.
Things to Know About the Watch
The DEFY Skyline Tourbillon Skeleton marks new territory for the collection launched in 2022, bringing the manufacture's most complex regulating organ into an entirely skeletonized configuration. While Zenith introduced another Rose Gold Tourbillon variant with Brick Red Dial to the Skyline line in 2025, this represents the first skeleton execution, eliminating the traditional dial entirely to reveal the movement's architecture as the watch's defining aesthetic. The 41 mm rose gold case—alternately satin-brushed and polished to accentuate its dodecagonal faceting—frames an entirely openworked El Primero 3630 SK calibre finished in intense blue PVD. The result is a timepiece that exists at the intersection of structural transparency and metropolitan elegance, its geometric forms echoing the cantilevers and relief of contemporary architecture.
The dial construction itself becomes an exercise in spatial design. Zenith's signature four-pointed star from 1969 is integrated directly onto the skeletonized mainplate, while the brand name floats above the calibre on the sapphire crystal. A peripheral flange anchors the hour markers and deepens the sense of three-dimensional depth. Two architectural bridges, positioned at 10 and 2 o’clock, feature double-tiered, sloping geometry that creates shifting relief across the dial surface, their forms reminiscent of modern structural engineering. The DEFY four-point star is integrated into the tourbillon at 6 o’clock that serves as a seconds indicator. Lastly, Zenith opted to add Super-Luminova to the hour markers and hands for excellent readability in low-light conditions.
The Movement
The beating heart powering this watch is the automatic El Primero 3630 SK calibre, beating at 36,000 vph (5 Hz) and delivering 50 hours of power reserve. The one-minute tourbillon at 6 o'clock comprises 56 components, its high-frequency rotation providing both technical performance and visual dynamism.
The movement's finishing demonstrates considerable artisanship: blue PVD treatment across the bridges and mainplate is selectively polished to reveal rhodium-plated chamfers that catch light with refined brilliance. The skeletonized barrel offers direct visualization of the mainspring's gradual unwinding throughout the power reserve cycle.
Zenith's star-shaped rotor, visible through the sapphire case back, features satin finishing that complements the overall architectural theme.
Summary & Price
Limited to 50 pieces, the DEFY Skyline Tourbillon Skeleton in rose gold represents Zenith's most sophisticated expression of the collection's urban-inspired design language. The integrated quick strap-change system allows seamless transitions between the rose gold bracelet and the star-patterned blue rubber strap with matching gold folding clasp—a practical consideration for contemporary collectors who value versatility alongside technical complexity.
By opening the calibre to its structural core and rendering it in contrasting blue and gold, the manufacture has created a timepiece in which mechanical complexity and architectural presence exist in harmonious balance, in their continued quest for Haute Horlogerie.
StickerPrice USD 103,700 USD. More info on Zenith, here.
