Blancpain Lady B: A 19 mm Mechanical Jewel Honouring Betty Fiechter

Blancpain Lady B revives the 1956 Ladybird Bullet with calibre 615 in a 19mm spherical case. Available from 17 September 2026 in the Middle East.

Reference Points

• Unveiled on 17 September 2026 to mark the 70th anniversary of the Ladybird collection, Blancpain Lady B (ref. 0064) pairs a 19 mm spherical case with the in-house calibre 615 in either polished stainless steel or 18K red gold.
• Calibre 615 measures 15.70 mm in diameter, comprises 180 components and a silicon balance spring, and delivers 38 hours of power reserve.
• The spherical case encloses a volume of just 2.9 cm³, with a double-tour calf leather strap available in seven colours passing directly through the case body.
• Priced at USD 12,600 in steel and USD 19,200 in red gold; not a limited edition.

Blancpain’s press release for ref. 0064 opens with a precise claim: the Ladybird Bullet of 1956, direct ancestor of the Lady B, housed the R52/R55 calibre at just 11.85 mm in diameter, which the brand describes as the world’s smallest round mechanical movement ever produced in series. Today’s 19 mm spherical case, at 13.2 mm thick, encloses a volume of 2.9 cm³. That figure, unusual in watchmaking, is the number Blancpain chose to define this watch entirely.

Design & Form

The case has no lugs. A 10 × 1.6 mm passage machined directly into the solid metal body allows the double-tour strap to thread through without external attachment hardware. The junction between the upper and lower case sections is obscured through polishing, so the watch presents as a single monolithic volume in the hand.

The dial is opaline on both versions, achieved through gold inlay. Applied gold stick indices measure 1.82 × 0.39 mm. The rehaut is entirely polished, extending the spherical curves optically. The crown carries the initials JB, a reference to Jean-Jacques Fiechter, Betty’s nephew and co-architect of the original Ladybird.

Movement & Materials

Calibre 615, introduced in 1995 and continuously refined since, beats at 3 Hz and carries Côtes de Genève decoration on its plates. Its 29 rubies and silicon balance spring represent the technical refinements accumulated over three decades of production. The case back geometry was designed specifically around the rotor’s trajectory within this 2.9 cm³ envelope.

Case finishing on both steel and gold variants is executed by hand after assembly, with polished, satin-finished, and micro-blasted areas applied in sequence. Engravings are cut with mechanical cutters rather than laser, so that depth and edge sharpness meet manufacture standards at this scale.

Who It Is For

Betty Fiechter, who joined Blancpain’s Villeret workshop in 1912 and became the first woman to lead a Swiss watch manufacture after acquiring the company in 1933, built the original Ladybird on a conviction that women’s timepieces merited the same mechanical integrity as any other watch. The Lady B carries that position without sentiment.

For the collector in Abu Dhabi or Jeddah who wears a watch against jewellery rather than a leather-strap sports piece, the double-tour configuration and seven strap colours (white, beige, mocha, burgundy, blue, or purple) make the Lady B adaptable across both formal and evening contexts. At 19 mm it sits closer to a cuff bracelet than a conventional watch.

The Verdict

Ref. 0064 is permanent catalogue, not a commemorative edition. At USD 12,600 for steel and USD 19,200 for red gold, it occupies the lower register of Blancpain’s price range while carrying the same calibre standards as larger pieces. The case volume of 2.9 cm³ is the technical measure that justifies the positioning: over thirty engineering drawings were required to bring that sphere to production.

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