Plus, other highlights of the brand’s recently-launched 2024 collection.
The post Cartier Turns Back Time With the New Santos-Dumont “Rewind” appeared first on Sharp Magazine.
Cartier has been on a bit of a heater lately. True, the august Parisian jeweller has been making some of the world’s most unique and stylish watches for more than a century, but thanks to the endorsements of A-list celebrities like Timothée Chalamet, Jacob Elordi and many others, a new generation of watch collectors has fallen in love with the brand’s catalogue. This is good news for all involved and a great excuse for Cartier to double down on its essential Cartier-ness while pushing its most iconic lines in new directions. Of the dozens of new designs announced at the recent Watches & Wonders Geneva trade show, here are the most buzzworthy.
The Cartier Privé Collection is like the brand’s VVIP back room, where the most exclusive (and expensive pieces) are offered to the world’s most discerning collectors. All pieces in the collection are highly limited, and most are refreshed versions of classics from the Cartier archive. This year’s Privé Collection included five new Tortue models, whose barrel-shaped case has been in the brand’s lineup on and off since 1928. The standout, however, is the Tortue Monopoussoir Chronograph which was previously re-released in 1998 as part of the Collection Privée Cartier Paris (aka CPCP, the predecessor to Cartier Privé). Per its name (monopoussoir is French for monopusher) the stopwatch can be started, stopped, and reset with the push of a single button – which is as nifty a feat of engineering in 2024 as it was in 1928. With a choice of a platinum case and a ruby cabochon or yellow gold and sapphire, and limited to 200 numbered pieces, it’s as refined as it is exclusive. In other words, a textbook Cartier Privé creation.
Created in the early 1900s for pioneering aviator (and friend of the Maison) Alberto Santos-Dumont, the Santos owns the distinction of being the first-ever wrist-worn pilot’s watch, and one of the first modern wristwatches for men. With a more robust presence on the wrist than the Tank or Panthére, it’s one of Cartier’s most popular 21st-century lines, with a wide range of sizes, materials and movements on offer. This year’s novelties included half a dozen new Santos models, including this one featuring a second time zone and a day/night indicator in the subdial at six. With its large polished stainless steel case, a satin-finish anthracite grey sunray-brushed dial, and a matching anthracite alligator leather strap, Alberto Santos-Dumont would have surely approved.
As any Cartier fan knows, the Maison is a jeweller first and a watchmaker second, but that doesn’t prevent it from regularly releasing some of the most interesting and unusual movements out there. The Santos-Dumont Rewind ticks that box in this year’s collection, with a reversed manual winding calibre 230 MC that moves backwards, rather than forwards (and Roman numerals arranged counter-clockwise on the dial to match). Does this make it difficult to read? Perhaps. But with its platinum case and a highly limited run of 200 numbered pieces, it’s the kind of piece that every Cartier fan dreams of owning.
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