Cigar Aficionado

How does a watchmaker improve on one of its best-selling watch models? If you're Maurice Lacroix, you give it more "cinq." Or, as the Cinq&Cinq name suggests, you take five and add five. Unveiled at the BaselWorld watch fair in April, the Masterpiece Cinq&Cinq is the latest in Maurice Lacroix's Masterpiece Collection. Watch enthusiasts will recognize its resemblance to the Masterpiece Cinq Aiguilles, but while the Cinq&Cinq pays due respect to its predecessor, it also takes luxury watches to a new level.

The Cinq&Cinq has the same sleek and sporty appearance as the Cinq Aiguilles, which means "five needles" in French, and features five hands (hour, minute, second, weekday and date) running off a similar centralized dial—a complication designed especially for the watch. One crown controls all of the hands, each of which has a different shape to avoid confusing the hands. Silver-colored hands indicate the time, a red-tipped hand tells the days of the week (located on the outermost ring), and a hand with a half moon at its end shows the date (on the innermost ring). The face of the watch, which measures a generous 42 millimeters in diameter, and its design also allow for easy viewing.

But why the extra cinq? What sets the Cinq&Cinq apart from other watches in the Masterpiece Collection is a new manufacture movement called the ML120. Designed and manufactured in-house by Maurice Lacroix, the ML120 is an automatic caliber movement that provides the Cinq&Cinq with a power reserve of 120 hours, or five (cinq) days.

The Masterpiece Cinq&Cinq is available in stainless steel (about $6,950) or pink rose gold ($7,000). And like all of the watches in the Masterpiece Collection since its 1990 introduction, the Cinq&Cinq continues Maurice Lacroix's watch-making tradition, while employing innovative designs and adding new functions to the marque.

Visit www.mauricelacroix.com.