Gucci Launches High Watchmaking Collection

Gucci Launches High Watchmaking Collection

MILAN — Alessandro Michele is channeling his whimsical creativity and distinctive design elements into Gucci’s high watchmaking collection.

Gucci launched its first timepieces in 1972 — all made in Switzerland — but in this year marking the brand’s centenary, the company is unveiling four lines under the high watchmaking umbrella: Gucci 25H; G-Timeless; Grip, and high-jewelry watches.

Gucci’s watch headquarters are based in Neuchâtel, Switzerland. Quality control, assembly and diamond setting take place in the Swiss plant of La Chaux-de-Fonds, while dials and special decorative techniques are crafted in Gucci’s Fabbrica Quadranti facility in the Canton of Ticino.

Gucci‘s GG 727.25 watch calibre is developed and produced by the state-of-the art Kering movement manufacture in La Chaux-de-Fonds, Switzerland. Self-winding and ultra-slim at just 3.7 mm in height, the GG 727.25 calibre makes its debut in the Gucci 25H, which has a playfully symbolic name, containing a number that the brand’s creative director considers a talisman and one he often features in his collections for Gucci. According to the company, the GG 727.25 calibre references other important numerical symbols: “seven for completeness; two representing balance and cooperation, and five symbolizing curiosity and freedom.” The ultra-slim case and sleek, sporty lines can be worn by men and women alike.

A mechanical watch design, the Gucci 25H is presented in steel and pavé-set models and two dynamic tourbillon iterations in platinum and yellow gold.

The Gucci 25H watches retail at between 8,500 euros and 11,000 euros for the automatic version and between 120,000 euros and 170,000 euros for the tourbillon version.

The G-Timeless creations comprise five designs: the G-Timeless Dancing Bees, with a high-jewelry touch with bees that shimmer and move on the dial. The watch is also offered in tourbillon versions, retailing at between 95,000 and 200,000 euros.

Also presented are the G-Timeless Automatic with bee motif, jeweled hard-stone dials and precious skin straps; the mystical G-Timeless with moon phases, and the G-Timeless Pavé, a white-diamond encrusted automatic watch with alligator strap.

Five Grip high watchmaking variations are crafted in precious materials, each fitted with a Jump Hour movement module triggered to jump forward every hour, to a minutes disc that sweeps around through 60 minutes. The technology is creatively expressed on the new models in curved openings on each dial, allowing a clean numerical display.

Hardstone dials adorn three 18-karat gold Grip models — two in yellow gold, the other in white gold. “Each dial is precision-cut by a highly skilled gemstone cutter who must shape the delicate material while maintaining its strength,” said the company. The Grip design is fitted with an alligator strap in a shade that corresponds to the color of its stone dial.

The fourth design in the Grip gold series is created entirely in 18-karat yellow gold with a brushed gold dial engraved with the Gucci logo and straight, gleaming bracelet links. Each 18-karat gold Grip watch is precision-set with a continuous row of 44 baguette-cut diamonds. The Grip Gold is priced at between 150,000 euros and 250,000 euros.

Grip Sapphire, a Jump Hour watch in a case entirely crafted in sapphire crystal, is the fifth edition in the Grip line. It is presented in four color variations — clear, blue, green and pink — with a transparent rubber tone-on-tone strap embossed with the interlocking G motif and with a steel ardillon buckle. The Grip Sapphire retails at between 80,000 euros and 100,000 euros.

The high jewelry watches are inspired by the brand’s design motifs: the Dionysus, the Lion Head and Gucci Play. Each design is created around a quartz movement.

The watches will be presented by appointment at Gucci’s fine watch and jewelry boutique in Paris, in Place Vendôme.

Forget Fashion Watches: Gucci Is Getting Into Serious High Horology With 33 New Models

It’s a big year for Gucci and the Italian house is aiming to make a splash. In celebration of its 100th anniversary, the brand is stepping up its game by entering the world of haute-horology. Back in 1972, Gucci was one of the first major fashion brands to embrace timekeepers as a style statement. To date, they are the largest producer of fashion watches in the world. Almost 50 years later, the company takes its watch offering up a notch. In a total of four high-end collections, 33 new models have been unveiled (four of which can be transformed multiple ways). And, unlike other fashion houses that delve into this category but don’t necessarily get too involved, Gucci’s creative director, Alessandro Michele, is said to have had his hands on the design process.

The collections, which include everything from tourbillons and jumping-hour movements to fully gem-set pieces and sapphire-crystal constructions, are assembled in Switzerland’s watchmaking mecca in La Chaux-de-Fonds at the Kering watch manufacture. Dials are crafted in the Gucci-owned Fabbrica Quadranti facility in the Canton of Ticino in Besazio, Switzerland. The design is conceived in Neuchâtel, Switzerland, where Gucci houses its watch headquarters. The company’s first “in-house” movements are featured in the 25H (in all models) and G-Timeless Dancing Bees (in the tourbillons) collections.

The design is everything you would expect from Michele’s eclectic style. Several of the pieces incorporate his love affair with witchy iconography including stars, lions or tigers, snakes and bees. The latter three make up what the designer refers to as the Gucci Garden: Bees representing love (in reference to their honey-producing nectar), snakes symbolize rebirth (represented by its skin-shedding) and lions, of course, owning the idea of power and ferocity. Bees take flight in the G-Timeless collection, which includes tourbillon versions with or without diamonds, including two fully diamond-set bracelet offerings (115,000-195,000 euros or approximately $136,730-$231,850), while the Lions Head range (55,000-59,000 euros or approximately $65,400-$70,150) is a take on a secret-watch concept with the roaring head, set with diamonds in the mouth and eyes, swiveling to reveal time underneath on turquoise, malachite or tiger’s eye stone dials. The snake slithers onto the bezel of daintier pieces like the Dionysus and Play pieces. Appropriately, the latter can shed its bezel around either a mother-of-pearl or pavé diamond dial (8,500-18,500 euros or approximately $10,100-$22,000) to take on new forms in 13 variations ranging from a yellow-gold snake with a single precious stone for the eye to white-gold snakes encrusted with diamonds and precious stones.

Michele is, of course, at his best when playing to his penchant for the unconventional. The Gucci Grip watch, a quartz-powered timepiece inspired by the unusual jumping hour movements of early 20th-century Audemars Piguet, Patek Philippe and Cartier watches, has become an icon of the house. Now, it’s taken to new heights with mechanical movements housed in 18-karat white-gold and yellow-gold cases accented with 44 baguette-cut diamonds around the edge with stone dials in onyx, malachite and tiger’s eye or brushed-gold (150,000-250,000 euros or approximately $178,350-$297,250). Four entirely sapphire crystal editions (including the bracelet) come in clear, blue, green and pink for a fresh take on the staple (85,000 euros or approximately $101,000). The transparency of the cases allows for a full view of the numerical wheels with two different highlighted pastel windows for reading the current time. Although pictures were not yet available for publication, we can assure you these are sure to become the must-have pieces in the Grip lineup, especially for the streetwear obsessed.

But the G-Timeless Moonphase collection (32,000 euros each or approximately $38,000) is most reflective of Michele’s penchant for a heavy dose of romanticism and mysticism. Circling the moon phases is the Latin phrase Sine Amore Nihil (Nothing Without Love). Stars, shooting stars, tiny Saturns, diamonds and precious gems sprinkle the black or white mother-of-pearl dials. Like something lifted from a clairvoyant’s signage, they have a kind of magical appeal. They also look not unlike some of the extraordinary designs on gowns we’ve seen float down the Gucci catwalk in Milan. Equipped with quartz movements, these pieces are more about the dreamy design and materials, including 181-169 diamonds set in 18-karat white gold.

Diamonds and stone dials aren’t for everyone, so Gucci included a few straightforward timepieces in the collection. The sporty 25H range, named after Michele’s favorite numbers, comes in ultra-slim automatic time-only steel models (8,200 euros for steel or 10,500 euros for steel with a diamond-set bezel or approximately $9,750 and $12,485) or two tourbillon versions in platinum (170,000 euros or approximately $202,230) or yellow gold (120,000 euros or $142,680).

Needless to say, there is plenty to buzz about, but you will have to dig your claws rather deep into your pockets if you want a piece of Gucci’s fashionable take on high horology.

NFTs Arrive in the Watch World

The latest crypto-token craze is spilling over into watches.

Following a torrent of record prices for digital assets from artwork to sneakers, the first watch NFT — or “nonfungible token,” verified by blockchain technology — was offered early this month. It didn’t sell, and the auction has been extended.

But other NFT prices, realized on online platforms and by traditional auction houses, seem to signal that NFTs are attracting investors as well as creating new ways to own or just enjoy watches as dematerialized assets. And more watch NTF auctions are scheduled.

The first watch NFT to go on sale was the Bigger Bang All Black Tourbillon Chronograph Special Piece, offered by Jean-Claude Biver, the industry veteran who emerged from retirement to seize an opportunity to make history.

“What we are doing today is a world first that will have wings,” Mr. Biver said in a Zoom presentation on March 30, at the beginning of the original six-day auction. “We are at the start of something great.”