by Carol Besler
Watches and Wonders Geneva hosted 65 exhibitors this year, a record number of brands, which means that even with a good pair of sneakers and excellent time management skills, it is impossible to see every new launch from every brand. Over the four days I covered the show, it was possible to spot some solid trends, but a little harder to narrow everything down to my top 10 favorites. This year’s show yielded some of the most beautiful watches I’ve ever seen – from daily wears to special editions, the creativity, quality and, for lack of a better word, appropriateness was right on. By appropriate, I mean just the right sizes, just the right amount of adornment and somehow just the right designs for the spirit of the times. The only thing that didn’t strike me as appropriate were prices, which felt unusually high across the board. But what else is new?
First, trends
- Nearly everyone launched at least one skeletonized watch this year, in some universal endeavour to reveal the complexities and hand finishing that go into the production of a mechanical movement. Decoration, movement architecture and unique design are important elements of caliber creation, as makers distinguish themselves with refinements that make theirs unique and worth taking an inside look at.
- Color. From enameling to colored gemstones, hardstones and straps (all now interchangeable), there is more color in luxury watches than there ever was during the fashion watch craze of the 1990s. Except now the gemstones are real, the enamel is more vibrant and the straps are designed to last. Green dials were everywhere, as were light blue, and brown paired with rose gold is emerging.
- Chronographs had a moment during the fashion era as well, but they were mostly quartz. Even during the mechanical revolution of the past 30 years, most chronographs remained module compositions. The number of integrated and innovative in-house chronographs has exploded however. This year TAG Heuer and Parmigiani Fleurier were among those introducing new calibers.
- Minute repeaters and striking watches are having a musical moment, including an Hermès Arceau with a very on-brand window on the dial, and Patek Philippe’s surprising Paraiba tourmaline-laced Ref. 5374. Is this why Morgan Stanley/LuxeConsult is reporting a steady increase in the average price of a luxury watch? Or is it the next trend category ….
- Jewelry watches were everywhere, with diamonds framing everything from unique windows on the dial to fully set watches with fancy cuts and shapes. Added value? You bet.
- Smaller cases. Ladies’ watches have been shrinking to petite cocktail sizes for a few years now. For men’s watches, the new standard increasingly sits between 36mm and 39mm – with some 34 and 35mm examples – a shift from the 41-43mm norm. That means they are designed to be more gender neutral. Good news for smaller wrists.
Here are my subjective top 10 picks, restricted to Palexpo launches only.
1. Rolex Grand Feu Daytona
This seems like an obvious choice, but it’s a great watch. Putting a grand feu dial on the world’s most famous sports watch is final confirmation that we are not wearing a chronograph simply for sports but for style and status. It therefore seems natural to endow the Daytona with the most lush of luxury dial finishes. It’s off-catalog and only a few will be made, so I feel lucky just to have seen it. It’s proof that Rolex is taking it up a notch, artisanally speaking, when it comes to its usual very industrial production process. It’s enough to make us almost forget that the Coke was quietly put to rest earlier this year.
2. Cartier Privé Crash Skeleton
The Privé series is geared to the collector community and described by Cartier as “a contemporary interpretation of an emblematic and exclusive shape from Cartier's watchmaking heritage.” In that category, the Crash reigns supreme. This one is part of a trio of platinum Privé pieces including a Tank Normale and a Tortue Chronograph Monopoussoir. The openworked, hand-hammered Roman numerals extend to the case side and do double duty as movement bridges. The Privé Crash Skeleton is limited to 150 pieces. Price on request.
3. Patek Philippe Ref. 5374/400P-001
The GOAT of watchmaking released several winners this year: the World Timer Ref. 7129J-001 with a brilliant carmine red dial and the dreamy Celestial 6105G-001 date/sunrise/sunset/sky chart complication. But my favorite is the Ref. 5374/400P-001 perpetual calendar/minute repeater with 48 Paraiba tourmaline baguettes (2.53 cts), along with 72 baguette diamonds (5.64 cts) set into the bezel, and another 86 baguette diamonds (3.5cts) on the case. The stitching on the strap matches the Paraibas. This piece is a rare departure for Patek Philippe, whose aesthetic rarely veers from the unadorned, except in its annual Rare Handcrafts collection.
4. Parmigiani Fleurier Tonda PF Chronograph Mysterieux
If what you like is the look of a chronograph, with its typical trio of busy subdials, then the Tonda PF Chronograph Mysterieux is not for you. If you appreciate the chronograph function itself but not the busy-ness of the typical layout, this is your grail. It’s a discreet, new complication with hidden talents. At rest, it looks like a regular three hand, but when you start the chronograph, hour, minute and seconds hands jump to 0 and begin functioning as chronograph seconds, and hour and minute totalizers. Simultaneously, rose gold hour and minute hands hidden underneath the rhodium-plated hands take over the running time. Another click of the pusher resets everything, hiding the rose-gold hands again. So when not using the chrono function, what you mostly see is the Tonda PF’s signature grain d’orge guilloché dial, here in gorgeous mineral blue.
5. Hermès Arceau Samarcande
Among the sweep of skeletonized watches launching at the fair, none were quite as innovative as this openworked minute repeater from Hermès. It isn’t just that the window revealing the mechanism is shaped like a horse head – a whimsical way to represent the brand’s signature equestrian theme – but the cut-out specifically exposes part of the striking works of the minute repeater. it is positioned so that the blued screw on the striking barrel serves as the eye of the horse-shaped cut-out. Hermès calls it a mise-en-scène where function converses with aesthetics.” It’s a clever twist in the monotony of so many openworked dials now.
6. A. Lange & Söhne Saxonia Annual Calendar
The Lange aesthetic is one of the purist expressions of classic watchmaking, but it has until lately been mostly geared, size wise, to men. That began to change last year with the launch of the 34mm 1815 models (down from 38.5). This year it gave us a newly compact Saxonia Annual Calendar measuring 36mm x 9.8mm, down from 38.5mm for the original (launched in 2010 and phased out around 2021). The movement, automatic caliber L207.1, is new, with a platinum central rotor and a 60-hour power reserve. It retains the brand’s signature hand-engraved balance cock and screwed gold chatons.
7. Van Cleef & Arpels Midnight Heure d’ici & Heure d’ailleurs
This is not a new watch, but now seems the perfect time for a new version of it: at a time when jump hours are trending, a double jump hour seems especially poignant. The watch is a dual timer (the name translates to “time here and time elsewhere”), with the jump hours tracking local and home time and a retrograde minutes in between. The movement, which is integrated rather than a base caliber with a module, is made exclusively for VCA by Jean-Marc Wiederrecht of Agenhor, and was first introduced in 2014. This new version heralds a trend toward brown dials in pink gold cases that is just emerging. The dial is embossed in a piqué motif on the inner dial and a guilloché pattern on the outside.
8. Chopard L.U.C Quattro Spirit 25 Straw Marquetry
You have to admire the patience and fortitude of the craftsperson who sits at a bench for hours with glue and scalpel in hand, composing a rigorous pattern made of miniscule, fragile pieces of straw. The rye straw is sourced from Burgundy, chosen for its natural sheen, and each strand is individually split with a fingernail into tiny pieces of various thicknesses and assembled into a honeycomb motif. A final wax coating gives it extra sheen. The purity of this dial, with a simple jumping-hour aperture and nothing else, is perfect for metiers applications. It was introduced in 2021, with a sleek grand feu dial, followed by various special editions, including a black enamel dial version and a Year of the Dragon piece with a gold engraved dial.
9. Bremont Altitude Chronograph Pulsograph Valjoux 23
It’s one thing to make a salmon-colored dial, something universally loved by all watch collectors, it seems. But to apply it in more than one shade and more than one finish, then add a chronograph function with contrasting subdials and throw in a pulsometer scale, and still end up with a dial that looks sleek and elegant, is, in my view, a feat. So is the movement: Bremont managed to source 40 vintage Valjoux 23 hand-wound chronograph movements produced between 1916 and 1974. Known for its quality, the Valjoux 23 was once used by brands like Patek Philippe, Vacheron Constantin, Rolex, and Heuer. The movements were restored and decorated by Bremont in collaboration with Swiss movement maker and refinisher Chronode.
10. Zenith G.F.J. Bloodstone
The GFJ was the hit of last year’s show and went on to win the Chronometry prize at the Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genéve. Knowing when to seize an opportunity, Zenith brings it back immediately with two new dials, one of which is this bloodstone version. The name is deceiving, since is suggests red coloring. It is, in fact, green, but with veins of reddish brown iron-oxide matrix, which is said to resemble blood splatters. It looks perfect with the yellow gold case. G.F.J. stands for Georges Favre-Jacot, who founded Zenith in 1865. In his endeavor to create “the perfect watch,” he developed movements that over the years won thousands chronometry prizes. Zenith’s caliber 135, produced between 1949 and 1962, was the star of these observatory chronometer competitions, and it is reproduced for this series. The Bloodstone version is limited to 161 pieces.
