Louis Vuitton Watches Plays a Long Game
When the redesigned Louis Vuitton Tambour was introduced in mid-2023, it marked a change in direction for the Parisian luxury company's watch division.
The time-only steel sports watch started at $18,900, about three times the cost of the collection's previous entry point. At the time Jean Arnault, the company's director of watches, acknowledged that the new design, with its focus on high-end finishing, was 'a gamble.'
Eighteen months later, Mr. Arnault said the bet had not yet paid off, but he was playing a long game. 'Commercially, it's working quite well,' he said. 'But collectors I was in contact with initially were happy to see Louis Vuitton moving in that direction, but skeptical when it came to buying.
'It takes around three years for a design to settle — 2025 will be that year.'
And last month he added a new series of 11 Tambour models at even higher prices than the 2023 pieces.
One of them, the Tambour Convergence, is what watchmakers call a montre à guichet, or aperture watch, with a window in the dial through which the time is read on two rotating discs. The 37-millimeter watch, which Mr. Arnault said was intentionally designed to be unisex, is offered in pink gold ($33,500) or platinum set with 795 diamonds ($60,500).
'All of our watches in the future will be unisex as long as the competition allows,' he said.
The Tambour Taiko Spin Time collection features an existing Louis Vuitton complication: spinning blocks at the 12 hour-marker points indicate the time. The six-model collection includes a world-time version called Air Antipode ($99,500), and tops out with the Air Flying Tourbillon, a design that displays the tourbillon, a device that counters gravity's effects on timekeeping ($172,000).
Louis Vuitton also introduced four new in-house automatic movements into the Tambour collection.
'I like for collectors to understand Vuitton is not in the watchmaking business to make volumes,' said Mr. Arnault, 26. 'We're here to please collectors. We're not trying to triple volumes. We stand for artisanal watchmaking.'
As a result, some designs may have a deliberately short shelf life. 'I'm a conservative guy and I want to make sure collections are as small as possible,' he said. 'As soon as we introduce something new, we remove something else. Will Convergence become part of our core collection? I don't know.'
Under Mr. Arnault's direction, Louis Vuitton has integrated skills and artisans into its La Fabrique du Temps watchmaking factory in Geneva. The division, called La Fabrique des Arts, was opened in 2023 and has added enamelers, engravers and gem setters. He said the factory's staff numbers had increased to about 200 from 60 and that more than 80 percent of any Louis Vuitton watch is now produced in the factory.
Mr. Arnault declined to provide sales figures, but said the watch division's annual output was in the low thousands and that he hoped to grow production by 2 to 3 percent a year.
Is there a market for Louis Vuitton watches beyond collectors? 'It's too early to say,' Mr. Arnault said. 'But a lot of the feedback from top collectors is that they love Vuitton watches because they don't see them on other people's wrists. I want to keep that.
'It's sort of anti-business, but it's better for us to position ourselves in that community rather than to have a watch on everyone's wrist.'
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Boston Globe
3 days ago
- Boston Globe
The best souvenir they ever got on vacation? A professional photo shoot.
Even as technology puts photography in everyone's pockets, travelers are increasingly investing in high-end, high-priced images of themselves and their families and friends on vacation. Companies including Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up 'Sometimes when you go on a special trip, the selfie doesn't really capture what you're seeing, what you're feeling, or the magic of the city,' said Nicole Smith, who started Flytographer after hiring a photographer to take pictures of herself and a friend during a vacation to Paris from the job she held at the time at Microsoft. Advertisement Companies including Flytographer and Local Lens have popped up to connect consumers with local photographers around the world, who take memorable portraits against backdrops of iconic landmarks. Shown here, Florence. FLYTOGRAPHER 'People want to be able to remember their special stories forever,' Smith said. 'All I wanted to bring back from that weekend was a memory. I really wanted to capture the Parisian architecture. And that was the only souvenir I wanted to bring back.' Advertisement She said one person in a couple or a group is often expected to act as the photographer. 'There's someone always trying to take the photo and usually missing from it,' Smith said. In Colleen Simms's family, that was typically her. 'As the mother, I feel like I wasn't always in the pictures,' said Simms, of Cohasset. So she and her husband have also gotten into the habit of arranging for professional photographers on their vacations. 'The world is full of such beautiful places, and the backdrops just remind you: 'I was there'' — especially since she's now in the photos, too — Simms said. It isn't cheap. Photo sessions booked through Companies including Flytographer and Local Lens have popped up to connect consumers with local photographers around the world, who take memorable portraits against backdrops of iconic landmarks. Shown here, Honolulu. FLYTOGRAPHER There are other ways to find professional photographers to shoot vacations. 'You spend a lot of money and time going on vacation, then you come home and sometimes there's a letdown,' Simms said of the cost. 'You see those pictures and they're a reminder.' Advertisement Now she has a succession of photos of her children growing up, on vacations they've taken together to Ireland, the Amalfi coast, and other destinations. 'Every time we travel, my kids are, like, 'Oh, what's Mom going to make us do,' she said. But 'childhood is so fleeting, and to capture them each year, and in all these amazing places — the pictures become really special treasures of a moment in time.' Photos like these are much more than simply decorations on the mantle, agreed Crista Dix, executive director at the Griffin Museum of Photography in Winchester. 'They trigger an emotional response, a sense memory, a moment in time, whether they're digital or printed,' Dix said. 'It's a moment that you have in that image.' The museum is named for Arthur Griffin, a Lawrence-born photojournalist for Time and Life magazines who often shot travel photos. Those kinds of pictures in particular 'show what you do, who you are, where you go. And they can be passed on,' Dix said — unlike a T-shirt or another kind of souvenir. Companies including Flytographer and Local Lens have popped up to connect consumers with local photographers around the world, who take memorable portraits against backdrops of iconic landmarks. Shown here, Bali. FLYTOGRAPHER Few people still paste photos and ticket stubs in photo albums, but many now make photo books, she said. And while many phones take great photos for these purposes, 'there's something to be said for the viewpoint of an artist,' said Haley Price, managing partner of Local Lens. 'They capture the entire landscape of a place.' Local photographers can also offer restaurant and sightseeing recommendations. 'That's a key value to the service, Price said. Customers 'get to connect to this local. They can tell you about the city, their favorite spots, what to do, what not to do.' Advertisement That increasingly includes locations for marriage proposals, bachelor and bachelorette parties, couples on honeymoons, and others. 'The trend has been to commemorate something or celebrate something with travel,' Price said. 'This has been growing and growing. People who are looking to celebrate something, they're going somewhere.' And many want professional photos to commemorate it. Debbie Tseng and her husband got a Flytographer gift card as a honeymoon gift, and have continued to hire local photographers when they've traveled ever since — to Rome, Paris, Maui. Often they will use one of the resulting photos as their holiday card picture. The last trip was to Tokyo with Tseng's parents, during cherry blossom season. 'It was such a lovely memory for my family, and our photographer there was really personable and knew all the spots for the late-breaking cherry blossoms,' said Tseng, who lives in Cambridge. Companies including Flytographer and Local Lens have popped up to connect consumers with local photographers around the world, who take memorable portraits against backdrops of iconic landmarks. Shown here, Cape Town. FLYTOGRAPHER 'The greatest joys in life are the memories that you make with your loved ones,' she said. 'Material things can come and go, but what you hold in your heart most fondly are the experiences.' Especially as life becomes more crowded, Price said, 'the experience of the vacation matters so much.' And photos 'just kind of transport you back to that moment.' Woody Benson thinks so, too. He buys gift cards from the photo companies during Black Friday sales, even before his family has decided where to vacation next. 'We know we'll use it even if we haven't planned our trips yet,' said Benson, of Sharon. The resulting photos 'are sort of like our keepsake for the big trips that we go on.' For Greg Gray, there's even more to it than that. He and his husband are heading to Paris for their 10th anniversary; they also went there for their fifth, and had professional photos taken then. Advertisement 'We'll take pictures of each other a lot, but unless we do something like this, we don't have many pictures together,' Gray said. 'Selfies are what they are, but they're not that great. These photos show us how we've changed, and our lives together.'
Business of Fashion
3 days ago
- Business of Fashion
Better Cotton Appoints Nick Weatherill CEO
Fashion's biggest sustainable cotton initiative, Better Cotton, has appointed former International Cocoa Initiative executive director Nick Weatherill as its new CEO. Weatherill takes over from Alan McClay, who has led the nonprofit organisation for the past decade. The 20-year-old initiative was set up by an international group of environmental organisations, brands and trade groups with the aim of rapidly increasing volumes of cotton produced with lower environmental impact and higher social standards. Roughly a fifth of the world's cotton production is now certified under the programme and it's become a go-to for brands from H&M to Louis Vuitton. But it's also come under fire from critics who argue its standards are too lax. Weatherill takes over after a period in which the organisation has moved to tighten up its oversight, introducing a traceability solution in 2023 and becoming a certification scheme earlier this year. Weatherill's 'appointment marks a renewed impetus that will ensure Better Cotton evolves to an even more impactful standard, benefitting the environment, farmers, workers, and local economies,' said McClay. Learn more: Are H&M and Zara Harming Forests in Brazil? Cotton linked to environmental and human rights abuses in Brazil is leaking into the supply chains of major fashion brands, a new investigation has found, prompting Zara-owner Inditex to send a scathing rebuke to the industry's biggest sustainable cotton certifier.
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Yahoo
Royal Ascot backs next generation of hat-makers from King's charity
The King's charity has announced a millinery partnership with Royal Ascot to nurture the next generation of hat-makers. Ahead of this month's world-famous meet, known as much for its colourful and creative displays of headwear as the horseracing, Ascot has introduced a £10,000 annual bursary to support a King's Foundation and Chanel graduating millinery student. Daniel McAuliffe, education director at The King's Foundation said: 'The royal family are incredible ambassadors for the craft of millinery and as the King's charity we are proud to be supporting the future of this skill at the most iconic hat-wearing event of the year.' The Foundation's students will also be showcasing their hats at this year's Royal Ascot, which runs from June 17-21, with a special display for racegoers in the Queen Anne Enclosure on the Berkshire course. The Chanel and The King's Foundation Metiers d'Art Millinery Fellowship in Partnership with le19M, Chanel's creative hub for artisans in Paris, was launched in 2024 with a cohort of six students. The intensive programme aims to develop a network of young specialist milliners in the UK, with the support of Parisian hat-maker Maison Michel at le19M. It forms part of The King's Foundation's wider work, inspired by Charles's passion for protecting traditional heritage skills at risk of being lost. Future students joining the millinery course will also be tasked with designing a Royal Ascot-inspired hat, with one selected to feature in the Royal Ascot Millinery Collective from 2026 onwards as its 11th design. The collective, which is celebrating its 10th anniversary, is an annual presentation of 10 bespoke designs created exclusively for Royal Ascot under the creative direction of British fashion designer Daniel Fletcher. Mr McAuliffe added: 'This is such a fantastic opportunity for our talented millinery students as they begin to build their businesses. 'We are delighted to be working with Ascot and our long-term partners Chanel and le19M to recognise the importance of the British tradition of millinery.' Felicity Barnard, Ascot Racecourse's chief executive, said: 'Exquisite hats and millinery masterpieces are woven into the very fabric of Royal Ascot's heritage and we are committed to preserving and celebrating this tradition for generations to come.'
