Saint Laurent helps GP revive a true ’70s watch

French fash­ion house Saint Laurent has col­lab­or­ated with Gir­ard-Per­regaux to cre­ate a fresh take on the lat­ter’s avant­garde LED watch from the 1970s: the Cas­quette . Around 8,000 Cas­quettes were pro­duced between 1976 and 1978. But the model was largely for­got­ten until 2021, when Gir­ard-Per­regaux partnered with Lon­don’s Bam­ford Watch Depart­ment to cre­ate a one-off piece for the bien­nial Only Watch char­ity auc­tion. A lim­ited run of 820 oth­ers fol­lowed and, now, Saint Laurent designer Anthony Vac­carello has reima­gined the watch (right) in black ceramic and titanium in an edi­tion of 100. The £5,105 watch is avail­able online from Saint Laurent’s stores in Paris and Los Angeles.

Heaven scent

Aude­mars Piguet has named Swiss-Italian exec­ut­ive Ilaria Resta as its new chief exec­ut­ive. Resta, who is cur­rently pres­id­ent of global fra­grances com­pany Firmenich, is due to take over next month from present incum­bent FrançoisHenry Ben­nah­mias, who has been with AP since 1993, serving as pres­id­ent and chief exec­ut­ive of the North Amer­ican oper­a­tion from

1999 until 2012 and as over­all chief exec­ut­ive for the past dec­ade. He will remain with the com­pany until the end of the year to ensure Resta makes a smooth trans­ition. Under the man­age­ment of Ben­nhamias, the firm’s turnover rose from SFr630mn ($702.8mn) in 2012 to SFr2bn last year — largely driven by sales of its sig­na­ture Royal Oak mod­els.

Archae­olo­gist favour­ite

Amer­ican-rooted, Swiss-owned brand Hamilton has con­tin­ued its long­stand­ing tra­di­tion of sup­ply­ing timepieces to the movie industry by equip­ping Har­rison Ford with the latest ver­sion of its art deco Boulton watch (above) to wear in Indi­ana Jones and the

Dial of Des­tiny — his final appear­ance as heroic archae­ology pro­fessor Indi­ana Jones. Released on June 30, the film sees Ford reprise the role for the fifth time along­side a slew of new cast mem­bers includ­ing Phoebe Waller-Bridge and Ant­o­nio Banderas — who appears as Jones’s long­stand­ing friend Ren­aldo and sports a Hamilton Khaki Navy Scuba watch.

Cast off

In con­trast to its focus on all things hightech, watch­maker Richard Mille has launched a regatta series for his­toric yachts. The inaug­ural Richard Mille Cup took place between June 10 and 25, attract­ing 15 yachts dat­ing from the late 19th cen­tury to the 1930s. Crews com­peted in a series of onshore and off­shore races staged between Fal­mouth and Le Havre, call­ing in to Dart­mouth and Cowes en route. A metre-high sil­ver trophy made by royal jew­eller Gar­rard was presen­ted to the out­right win­ner: a 108-year-old schooner called Mari­ette.

Call, col­lect

Jae­ger-Le Coultre has added 11 addi­tional pieces to its plat­form The Col­lect­ibles, which launched in Janu­ary to offer small selec­tions of its most sought after vin­tage mod­els. The latest pieces include an example of its rare 1960s ‘Deep Sea Bar­racuda’ dive watch (€30,300), a gold triple cal­en­dar model from the 1940s (€36,300), and an early example of its sig­na­ture ‘Reverso’ launched in 1931 (€54,500). Each watch is vet­ted and ser­viced at the man­u­fac­ture before sale. It is then sup­plied with a cer­ti­fic­ate from the archive, a new strap, and a copy of a cof­fee-table book con­tain­ing defin­it­ive inform­a­tion about 17 col­lect­able Jae­ger-LeCoultre mod­els pro­duced between 1925 and 1974.

On the (high) rise

Jacob & Co, maker of shame­lessly dec­ad­ent watches to the stars, has announced a move into the res­id­en­tial prop­erty busi­ness. The brand, famed for its hugely expens­ive, gem-set cre­ations, has partnered with UAE archi­tec­ture firm Bing­hatti to cre­ate a Dubai “hyper tower” that is expec­ted to be the world’s tallest res­id­en­tial build­ing. The prop­er­ties within — to be known as “man­sions, vil­las and pent­houses” depend­ing on size — range from homes cov­er­ing a quarter to two entire floors. Some will fea­ture private infin­ity pools, with the most expens­ive pent­houses being named after mod­els of Jacob & Co watches. Interior design is by Roman Vnoukov, cre­ator of the brand’s boutiques around the world.

Get­away car

Rising watch thefts in cent­ral Lon­don have promp­ted Danny Shahid of May­fair-based Dia­mond Watches Lon­don to offer cli­ents a free chauf­feur ser­vice from the firm’s Bur­l­ing­ton Arcade store. There is no min­imum spend required, with lux­ury cars being made avail­able for post­pur­chase jour­neys any­where within the M25. Shahid says watch col­lect­ors can also pro­tect them­selves by hav­ing only private social media accounts, by not post­ing in real time, and by keep­ing detailed records of their col­lec­tions.

Get the bug

An ultra-rare Mido Bugatti watch, made in 1925 and shaped in the form of the marque’s dis­tinct­ive radi­ator sur­round, is expec­ted to fetch up to £80,000 when it crosses the block at a Bon­hams auc­tion dur­ing the Good­wood Fest­ival of Speed on July 14. Dat­ing from 1925, the watch is one of 54 first series examples com­mis­sioned by Ettore Bugatti to give away to his fact­ory drivers and top fact­ory staff. Fewer than 20 are believed to have sur­vived, and it is known that eight of the series were provided to Bugatti racers includ­ing René Drey­fus, Rudolf Cara­c­ci­ola, and Louis Chiron. In 2021, Bugatti’s per­sonal example real­ised €272,800 at French auc­tion house Stan­islas Machoïr.

Vin­tage revival

Inde­pend­ent Brit­ish watch brand Ver­tex opened its first boutique, a bijoux premises in Lon­don’s fash­ion­able Shep­herd Mar­ket. The store, which com­prises two small rooms on two floors, is styled with a 1940s theme to reflect the brand’s his­tory as a sup­plier of watches to the Min­istry of Defence towards the end of the second world war. Ver­tex was foun­ded by Eng­lish­man Claude Lyons in 1916 and con­tin­ued to oper­ate up until the early 1970s when it went bust. Lyons’s great grand­son, Don Cochrane, revived the com­pany in 2015 and it now offers around a dozen mil­it­ary-inspired mod­els, all of which can be seen at the boutique.

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