Well, it was quite a ride. The gold rush experienced by the luxury watch industry in the wake of the pandemic was as unexpected as it was dramatic, but the slump was a-comin’ from a long way off, and this year it has hit home.
In January, Watches of Switzerland, one of the world’s largest retailers of Patek Philippe and Rolex, issued a profit warning that tanked its share price by more than a third. In March, the Federation of the Swiss Watch Industry (FH) reported a scary 16 per cent decline in exports compared to March 2023, while secondary market indices such as the Bloomberg Subdial Index have been in endless decline since the crazy highs of 2022.
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Cooling demand
Then, in April, the global industry gathered in Geneva for the Watches and Wonders jamboree, the watch biz trade show to rule them all, where the covers came off the key new pieces from the biggest brands.
And… well, not much to see here, boss. That’s not to say there weren’t some lovely watches: Patek’s new white gold World Timer, with a date display that corrects itself if you cross the dateline, for instance; the shapely wonder that is Cartier’s Tortue Monopoussoir chronograph, a legendary collector favourite that’s happily back (albeit in fleetingly rare numbers); an airy, effortlessly cool sports watch from Hermès named the Cut, which is ostensibly for women but is likely to be a unisex crossover.
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But grand designs, bold ideas and exciting creations that could galvanise the marketplace, initiate trends and create headaches for those who manage waiting lists? Not so much. Demand has cooled, the industry is in a holding pattern, investment is on pause, and ‘wait and see’ is the mantra; and by the looks on the faces of some executives I spoke to, ‘cross fingers and hope’.
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The new gold rush
Still, one gold rush passes and another rises up, as those with their eyes on the actual value of gold will have noticed. While the watch industry was gathered in Geneva, the gold price was screaming upwards to all-time highs, apparently driven by pesky Chinese speculators – which put an interesting light on the one identifiable (and rather antithetical) Watches and Wonders trend: all-gold bracelet watches. Like a line-up of barrel-chested, bejewelled Miami gangsters, these burly, big-time, high-rolling statement pieces were out in force. Talk about store of wealth.
The daddy of the pack, appropriately, was from Rolex, which splashed down with a startling version of its oceanic behemoth, the Deepsea, in 320 grams of solid 18k yellow gold. The Deepsea’s chunky profile, like a steroid-pumped version of the classic Submariner, is dictated by its advertised purpose as a highly specialised, hardcore tool for deep-water exploration.
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Hardcore now comes in soft, precious metal form, which Rolex assures me is the heaviest watch it has ever made. Given it has a depth rating of 3,900m, it will also presumably help you descend that bit faster. Useful for wrist curls too, or, more to the point, walking around like you own the damn joint. Which, at £45,700, you probably do.
Tudor, Rolex’s dynamic lower-priced sibling brand, is singing from the same hymn sheet. It has produced a gold version before of its all-conquering retro dive watch, the Black Bay, though only on a strap.
This time around it’s the perfectly proportioned Black Bay 58 (slightly smaller than the standard Black Bay) that’s been given the Midas touch-up, and this time with a bracelet too, in brushed 18k yellow gold. Paired with an olive green dial and bezel, it’s like a smaller, lither, (slightly) more streetwise version of Rolex’s gleaming showstopper. Although, these days I’d be very careful which streets I wore any of these on.
I’ll throw in mentions, too, for a sumptuous pink-gold iteration of Girard-Perregaux’s Laureato, which comes with dial options in sage green or ultramarine blue; and the otherworldly wonder of H Moser’s biomorphic Streamliner Tourbillon, rendered in rose gold with a minimalist dial of cut jade stone.
‘A lesson in refinement’
The gold model I’d really like to wear, mind, is from Patek Philippe, which has produced a scintillating bracelet for its rare and exquisite dress watch, the Golden Ellipse. Designed in 1968, the Golden Ellipse is a lesson in refinement and though it’s been rather underappreciated for many years (it hardly helps that Donald Trump, of all people, has been known to sport one, also on a bracelet).
Delicately artful dress watches, however, have been having a bit of a moment in certain vintage-loving quarters, and the intricate new bracelet gives this classic some serious pep. With its unusual, chevron-shaped links (more than 300 of them, all chained together by hand), it invokes the slinky tastes of the Golden Ellipse’s 1970s heyday, while adding lashings of creative finesse.
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It’s that decade, in fact, that begat the watch that arguably opened the door for today’s slew of golden bobby dazzlers. In 2022 Vacheron Constantin sprung a superbly executed revival of the 222, its cherished proportion, sports-luxe model from 1977, which left seasoned and cynical watch journalists weeping with admiration.
I’ve been a bit perplexed by the lack, as yet, of a follow-up, but at least it’s made space for Piaget to pull off a similar trick this year. In 1979 it tapped into the sports-glam trend with the Polo, its solid gold, none-more-disco ticker in which the fluted grooves of the golden bracelet extended across case and dial too.
At once minimalist, maximalist and totally postmodern, the Polo was a modish hit in the early 1980s. But, with its quartz. mechanism and high-concept stylisation, it found little favour with modern Piaget: when the brand fired up the Polo name once more in 2016, it was in the form of an insipid sports watch that, to me, spoke of a company deep in the creative doldrums.
In the meantime, though, the same cohort of tastemakers who coo over Golden Ellipses and the like were becoming exercised by this lost classic, opening the door for the brand finally to rehabilitate it this year. Like Vacheron’s 222, the new Polo 79 incarnation is a pitch-perfect rendition of the original design, given all the finesse and dazzle of modern craftsmanship. Now powered by an ultra-slim mechanical Piaget movement, its all-encompassing bracelet and case positively fizz with refinement and finish.
May this be the start of wonderful things, though if the Vacheron Constantin blue-print is anything to go by, we may have t wait a bit. Lord knows where the gold price will go in the meantime…
This feature first appeared in Spear’s Magazine Issue 92. Click here to subscribe
