The mood is expected to be cautious this week as 60 watch brands gather for the fourth annual edition of Watches and Wonders Geneva, the luxury watch industry’s only major fair. Industry data shows that makers have been struggling to attract buyers, with 2024 sales declining at all but a few brands.
But watchmakers have ridden out storms before. And brands have been talking about “postponement,” predicting that purchases are just being delayed and that the evergreen appeal of great design and the power of desire will bring those buyers back. When that moment comes, these latest creations will be waiting.
Let the good times roll
As history tells us, fortune often favors the brave, while those less bold are left behind. In the watch world, that means brand design must transcend the fads of the day as it can take years to bring a new watch to market. Here are six watches scheduled for release this week that show no sign of bending to any prevailing winds.
Bulgari Octo Finissimo Ultra Tourbillon
Bulgari’s first appearance at Watches and Wonders Geneva will be remembered for this watch. At 1.85 millimeters, or 0.07 of an inch, it takes the title of the world’s thinnest tourbillon (a mechanism designed to counteract gravity’s effects on timekeeping accuracy). And by beating the size that Piaget debuted only last year, Bulgari has logged its 10th world record for thinness, a milestone for the Italian jeweler turned Swiss watchmaker. As it is, the skeletonized BVF 900 movement in this 40-millimeter titanium design is the 14th caliber Bulgari has created since 2014, the year it first broke the world record with a five-millimeter tourbillion. Despite the sylphlike profile of the record-holder, its hand-wound caliber offers a 50-hour power reserve. Only 20 will be made.
Price on application
Cartier Privé Tank à Guichets
The prevalence of Cartier Tank watches on catwalks and red carpets over the past few years has confirmed that the Parisian watchmaker is still at its most desirable best. And while sales are booming, only a fortunate few will be able get their hands on the maison’s small-batch Cartier Privé editions. This Cartier Privé Tank à Guichets, which translates clumsily as a “windows watch,” is based on a 1928 design, and just 200 pieces are to be made. The design retains the silhouette of a World War I Allied tank, but less familiar is the way that the time is displayed through two openings cut in a solid platinum case (The result looks a bit like Cyclops with a wry smile). The hours digits “jump” from one number to the next while the minutes “drag” along a dial. Both are run by a hand-wound mechanical Cartier caliber made exclusively for the collection.
$61,000
Hublot Big Bang 20th Anniversary Titanium Ceramic
Which of the watches released over the past 25 years belong in the canon of all-time greats? Typically, four models are mentioned: Chanel’s J12; Bulgari’s Octo Finissimo; anything in a tonneau, or barrel, shape by Richard Mille; and this, Hublot’s Big Bang. Released in 2005, the first Big Bang was loud — brash, even — and of course big, at 44 millimeters. Made with a fusion of precious and high-tech materials, it put Hublot on the watch industry map. And here it is again, reissued in something approaching its original look, only a pinch smaller at 43 millimeters and now housing Hublot’s Unico 2 flyback chronograph caliber (a flyback function starts, stops and resets time tracking with a single pusher). Only 500 pieces in titanium ceramic are scheduled, each with a gold rotor and a crown engraved with a 20th anniversary logo.
$20,800
TAG Heuer Formula 1 Solargraph
One of the designs that put the newly branded TAG Heuer in the spotlight in 1986 was the Formula 1, a colorful, affordable quartz watch released that year. Now TAG Heuer is reviving that entry-level design to mark its return as Formula 1’s official timekeeper. The 38-millimeter watch is being created in a series of bright colors, set to roll out at Grand Prix races throughout the year. This yellow piece, for example, is tied to the Mexico City Grand Prix. Its daisy-shape bezel has been made of a renewable castor oil-based material called bio-polyamide, and its movement now is solar-powered. And like the original 1980s pieces, it has been priced to entice a new generation of Formula 1 fans.
$1,800
Piaget Polo 79
Piaget’s 150th anniversary was one of the bright spots on the watchmaking landscape last year, aided by the introduction of a classic TV-shape watch called the Andy Warhol and the long-overdue resuscitation of the Polo, the slimline sports-luxe classic introduced in 1979 by Yves Piaget for the celebrities and wealthy socialites of his Piaget Society cohort. The limited numbers of the yellow gold revival model made last year were sold in a flash, so no doubt this follow-up in white gold will go the same way. With its brushed horizontal links and polished gadroons, both of which carry seamlessly through the 38-millimeter case and dial, the design has a jewel-like quality that matches the brand’s high jewelry heritage.
$82,500
Van Cleef & Arpels Lady Arpels Bal des Amoureux Automate
If Van Cleef’s watchmaking business once felt like the amuse-bouche before a main course of fine jewelry, those days are clearly in the past. Certainly the impression was bolstered when it scooped up three awards at the Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève 2024, the annual industry awards event. And here’s another distinctive piece, an automaton watch featuring two lovers dancing at a guinguette, a type of open-air cafe popular in the Paris suburbs. They embrace at noon and midnight, and at the push of a button. Time is indicated by two stars that track retrograde hour and minute displays, while the dial is enameled in monochromatic shades of evening blue using a 16th-century technique known as grisaille.
$171,000
Safe bets, new tricks
When watch brands are trying to push through a crisis period, the usual model is to revert to what they and their customers know best. Some analysts call this a “flight to quality,” a term used to describe investors turning to gold as a safe haven when markets are volatile. That said, a twist never hurts, as these new pieces prove.
Jaeger-LeCoultre Reverso Tribute Monoface Small Seconds Milanese
The story of Jaeger-LeCoultre’s Reverso began in 1931, but this is the first time the Art Deco watch’s rectilinear, reversing form has been set on a slinky Milanese bracelet. Available in steel or, as here, in pink gold, the irresistibly louche chain-mail bracelet would stretch to 16 meters (52.5 feet) if it were laid out link by link. A grained dial and a case reverse left clear for personalization complete the picture.
$41,300
Panerai Luminor Perpetual Calendar GMT Platinumtech
The oversize watch with a crown protecting device has become a Panerai design cornerstone, but this 44-millimeter edition marks the first time the Luminor has been paired with a grand complication offering perpetual calendar and second time zone functions in a case made of the brand’s trademarked Platinumtech. Panerai says its alloy is 95 percent pure platinum (what makes up the other 5 percent is kept secret) and to be 40 percent harder than standard platinum.
$67,600
Chanel J12 Bleu X-Ray
Chanel said it spent 1,600 hours — more than 66 days — fashioning the case and bracelet of its new watch from a single block of transparent synthetic sapphire. Then it added natural sapphires: There are 196 of them in the bezel and bracelet, and 12 more as hour markers on the clear sapphire dial. That dial is actually a movement base plate, holding the parts in place so they appear to float. Hand-wound and 38 millimeters wide, it is to be limited to 12 pieces.
Price on application
IWC Ingenieur Automatic 35
Confirming the smaller watch trend is IWC, whose Ingenieur has been condensed to just 35 millimeters in diameter this year, a full five millimeters smaller than the model released two years ago. There is to be a blingy gold version and two in steel, including this black-dial model, each intended to give wider appeal to the brand’s stainless steel luxury sports watch. But IWC’s in-house calibers are too big for the smaller case, so it has fitted the 35 with a third-party automatic movement.
$9,950
Oris Big Crown Pointer Date
Don’t fix what isn’t broken, but if you can make it slightly better, do. Hastily fabricated aphorisms aside, Oris’s Big Crown has returned this year, not far short of its 90th anniversary and with its signature pointer date hand still reliably in position. Reborn with only the tiniest of tweaks to its fundamentals, it now comes on a metal bracelet and with a choice of sunny dial colors, including this peppy blue. As ever with Oris, the brand cachet to price ratio is disarmingly high.
$2,300
Audemars Piguet Royal Oak Offshore Selfwinding Chronograph/42MM
Audemars Piguet is not participating in Watches and Wonders Geneva, but the brand still merits attention because in its 150th year it has wrapped some of its most celebrated watches in a new shade of ceramic called Bleu Nuit, Nuage 50, a color developed in 1972 for the dial of the first Royal Oak. The dark shade looks particularly brooding in this heavyset flyback chronograph version of the Royal Oak Offshore.
$86,900
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