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The Cartier Vendôme Bi-Plan is an Art Deco masterpiece with a surprise twist! Cartier never ceases to amaze us with its creative twists on iconic designs. The Cartier Vendôme was introduced in the 1970s as an homage to the famed Place Vendôme square where the flagship Cartier boutique is located. The Vendôme introduced a round case—quite uncommon for Cartier—and lacked the traditional vertical lugs that connect the case to the bracelet. The Vendôme Bi-Plan sports the same round case and introduces two horizontal lugs that connect to the leather strap. As a result, the watch looks like the double-decker planes from the early 1900s with two sets of wings parallel to one another, which, you guessed it, are also known as bi-planes! The placement of the horizontal bars that sandwich the round case gives the watch a cool Art Deco quality. Perfectly in line with Cartier’s luxurious roaring twenties aesthetic. These horizontal lugs are not merely a design affectation. If you look closely, you’ll notice that the lugs are not even connected to the watch case. That’s because they are, in fact, part of an ingenious mechanism that incorporates the deployant clasp in the caseback of the watch! In practice, this means that you open and close the bracelet by lifting up and pressing down the watch case. This gives a streamlined and unobstructed view of the luxurious alligator leather strap. This ref. 2220 Vendôme Bi-Plan is executed in 18k yellow gold and measures 32 mm in diameter. The dial features the classic Cartier lay-out: an ivory background with fine guilloché engraving, black painted Roman numerals and a pair of blued sword hands. The blue details on the handset, of course, match with the blue sapphire cabochon that tops the crown. This Cartier Vendôme Bi-Plan dates back to the 2010s and is powered by a manual winding movement. The watch has just returned from a full service at Cartier and comes with service papers, a new blakc alligator leather strap, and a Cartier service pouch.