Today marks the final day of Watches and Wonders, the pre-eminent annual industry event in Geneva, the epicentre of Swiss watchmaking, where some 50,0000 watch lovers and collectors have descended to take in the hottest horological creations from the likes of Rolex, Patek Philippe, Cartier and many more. Here are the key trends from the so-called Olympics of the watch world that everyone should have on their radar.
Timely jewels
Gem-set watches are set to take centre stage. Given that jewellery is celebrated as one of the most resilient categories in the current luxury downturn, this comes as no surprise. Dior and Tiffany & Co were ahead of the game when they teased the bejewelled trend in January at Couture Week. The Grand Soir Automate Miss Dior timepieces combine an automata movement with Dior’s tradition of haute couture: dials are adorned with Monsieur Dior’s sketches depicting his Belle de Mai dress, imagined for spring/summer 1954, and Palmyre gown, from autumn/winter 1952. Tiffany, meanwhile, unveiled five new magnificent jewellery watches, two of which interpreted Bird on a Rock, the house’s iconic brooch, designed by Jean Schlumberger in 1965, and now delightfully spins on a dial with a flick of the wrist.
At Watches and Wonders, Cartier’s signature Panthère collection has been upgraded with a dazzling, animal print design that’s sure to turn heads. “We are trying to work on the attitude of the panther, to express its movement, by telling a story with the watch,” explains Marie-Laure Cérède, Cartier’s creative director of jewellery and watchmaking. The house is also debuting Tressage, a new jewellery watch collection that features a voluminous delight of twisted polished gold, with some models festooned with sapphires and diamonds.
This year, Van Cleef & Arpels is celebrating the 90 birthday of its clasp-style Cadenas watch, a long-time tastemaker’s favourite. The latest iteration of Cadenas, which means “padlock” in French, comes in a stunning pavé diamond version accented with sapphires. Chopard, meanwhile, is highlighting its signature L’Heure du Diamant collection – literal translation: “diamond hour” – that comes with a chunky diamond bezel, crafted with a special crown setting and V-shaped prongs for extra brilliance. A new campaign with Bella Hadid rounds out the offering.
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Elsewhere, Jaeger-LeCoultre adds metiers d’art to the mix: its limited-edition Reverso One Precious Colours required 60 hours of enamel work, and another 40 hours to set the watch’s 277 diamonds.
Seriously playful
While Watches And Wonders is a destination for serious watch players, lovers and collectors, there was still a touch of the whimsy and the playful afoot. Van Cleef & Arpels’s Pont des Amoureux watch, originally unveiled in 2010 and the first Poetic Complications piece to win a prize at the Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève tells the story of a couple who meet on a bridge in Paris. And the love story continues: four new watches were unveiled revealing the couple within beautifully sketched scenes on the dials that evoke different moments of the day.
This year, Vacheron Constantin’s Les Cabinotiers – a thematic collection dedicated to one-of-a-kind pieces – featured exquisitely decorated dials that pay homage to the Tour de l’ile, a historic Geneva landmark. At Hermès, equestrians – or not – would be hard-pressed to resist the mischievous horse depicted on this 12-piece limited-edition of the Arceau watch. The dial features impressive intricate horsehair marquetry, playful animation, engraving and a miniature painting technique that is utterly sublime.
Ice cream hues were the order of the day at Rolex. Its now-classic Oyster Perpetual now comes in pink, lilac, yellow and a delicious pistachio green. At Chanel, the Coco Black Jacket necklace watch took the silhouette of Gabrielle Chanel and dressed it in a black lacquered suit adorned with diamonds. She’s wearing a little black boater hat adorned with a diamond ribbon. Lift that up and you’ll find the watch dial. Genius. Necklace watches are trending: Piaget’s new ’60s sautoir is vintage styling galore, and Chanel’s The Blush Collection is inspired by beauty, with chain chokers or medallion-style necklaces coming in the shape of eye shadow palettes and lipsticks. Yes, really.
True blue
“It’s not black. It’s not white. It’s Bleu.” These were the words on a huge Chanel advertising billboard that is unmissable as you step off the plane and into Geneva airport. And if Watches and Wonders is anything to go by, Chanel called it. The colour blue – in all of its iterations – navy, ink blue, denim blue, turquoise blue, sky blue... you get the picture – was pretty much ubiquitous at the fair. Chanel’s J12 – which celebrates its 25th anniversary this year, now comes in an intense deep blue.
Ceramic has never been so desirable, either. Patek Philippe’s impressive Quadruple Complication – it has a minute repeater, chronograph and instantaneous perpetual calendar – juxtaposed a deep blue strap with an ice blue dial to sublime effect. The star player at Rolex is the Land-Dweller. A design triumph, it seamlessly merges an integrated bracelet – the Flat Jubilee – with the oyster case, and the dial also comes in ice-cool blue. At Hermès, the Arceau Le Temps Suspendu has been given a new aesthetic. Its open dial within the white or rose gold cases now features a “Time Suspended” module, the movement is visible through a transparent back and the straps come in three colours sunburst brun désert (a beige-brown), sunburst rouge ( a deep red) and a sunburst – you’ve guessed it – blue.
Piaget went down the art route. There were numerous shades of blue in various styles of watches, but the star was the newly named Andy Warhol watch – a nod to the partnership between Piaget and The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, as well as a recognition of the friendship between Yves Piaget and the iconic artist. The new high jewellery iteration – following on from the singular piece in the 2023’s High Jewellery collection, which featured a petrified wood dial and custom-made emeralds circling the case – has been switched up to an incredible deep blue opal dial with painterly flecks of green.
More soothing hues
In times of uncertainty, calming and muted tones tend to offer a kind of comfort (see Mocha Mousse, Pantone’s 2025 colour of the year). It makes sense, then, that so many of watch brands are also offering an understated mood, with watch dials and straps in natural, earthy and soothingly pale tones. Hublot’s new Spirit of Big Bang chronographs now come in the organic shades of sand beige, dark green (and sky blue). The colours saturate the porthole-shaped ceramic case through to the rubber straps, as well as the hour markers, chronograph counters and hands. Also embracing warm, neutral tones is Oris, which has introduced a host of new dial colours in its ultra-chic Big Crown Pointer Date collection. There is pastel-style terracotta and green, a smaller model in beige, and deeper tones of yellow, lilac and blue grey. Dolphin grey is Louis Vuitton’s colour choice for its new Tambour Taiko Spin Time collection, which launched in January. Featuring the house’s signature timekeeping display – inspired by vintage travel flip boards found at airports and train stations – the watch comes in six different models, including gem-set designs and another paired with a leather strap in beige.
Sporting complications
Luxe sports watches have been trending for some time, but for 2025, several brands are adding extra mechanical oomph to their signature lines. After reviving its all-steel Ingenieur sports watch in 2023, IWC has welcomed its first in-house perpetual calendar to the collection. Set on a striking blue dial featuring the Ingenieur’s distinct, etched grid pattern, it’s an elegant homage to one of watchmaking’s most beloved complications. Zenith, meanwhile, is celebrating its 160th birthday with a trilogy of its most famed chronographs, all crafted in striking, bold blue ceramic. The new Chronomaster Sport, Defy Skyline Chronograph and Pilot Chronograph can be purchased as an anniversary set. But if you choose them individually, we’d opt for the Pilot flyback chronograph with the ultra-cool, big-date display. Serving up Gen Z-friendly vibes are TAG Heuer’s new Formula 1 watches, (the brand is F1’s official timekeeper), which come in high-octane zingy shades and are now equipped with the watchmaker’s Solargraph movement. A two-minute exposure to direct sunlight charges up the watch for the entire day, while a full charge of around 40 hours will keep the watch ticking for up to 10 months – even if it’s stuck in a dark drawer.
Looking back, looking forward
Watches and Wonders is all about the shiny, all-singing, all-dancing new launches in the watch world. Or is it? This year, numerous brands, while showcasing the buzz of newness and innovation, also used the event as an opportunity for everyone to get a sneak peek into their jaw-dropping archives. If the purpose of Cartier’s cacophony of archive pieces showing in its space was to whet everyone’s appetite for their upcoming V&A exhibition which opens in London this month, then they absolutely succeeded. Chopard hinted at things to come by inviting guests into their Chopard Museum where stunning yesteryear pieces (the white gold bracelet wristwatch set with 40 diamonds on the dial, and 171 diamonds on the bracelet was a stand-out) rubbed shoulders with a new iteration of a Chopard stalwart, the Happy Sport, in white gold and an aventurine glass dial that houses free-moving diamonds – more of which are encrusted around the face of the watch. Bulgari, celebrating its debut at Watches and Wonders this year, followed their groundbreaking, award-winning 2014 Octo Finissimo Tourbillon with a sequel: the Octo Finissimo Ultra Tourbillon. Measuring just 1.85mm in thickness, this is now the thinnest tourbillon watch ever. (Someone was overheard saying it was “thinner than a Swiss franc”). Jostling for attention were also numerous vintage variants of Bulgari’s iconic Serpenti watches, many embellished with diamonds, turquoise, emeralds, rubellites, as well as the new Seperti Aeterna, a futuristic transformation of the Serperti which comes in rose gold, adorned with diamonds, as well as its high-jewellery counterpart in fully pavé-set white gold. No eyes, no scales – just the essence of a serpent distilled to a minimalist’s dream.
